The Lover

by Nicole Jordan

  His mouth curled with grim amusement. “I trust you will. I want you scratching and clawing at me. An angry spitfire makes good bedsport.”

  “Bedsport!” Her fingers clenched into angry fists.

  Resting one knee on the bed, Niall stood over her challengingly, his eyes burning into hers. Trapped by his powerful body, Sabrina dropped her incensed gaze to his splendid arousal, huge and thrusting.

  She could feel her heart pounding. Niall would win if she let him touch her.

  Turning abruptly, she lunged for the foot of the bed, trying to escape, but Niall flung himself after her. Covering her with his body, he pinned her down with his weight, pressing her chest into the mattress. Her cry of outrage was muffled by the covers.

  “Aye, play the spitfire for me, Sabrina…Let me feel your fury. You’re hotter and tighter when you’re angry, just how I want you.”

  Ignoring her wild struggles, Niall drove his straining manhood against her skirts, probing the soft buttocks beneath. “That’s it, fight me, sweet tiger. I want you writhing and breathless when I drive deep inside you. I want you moaning my name, pleading with me to love you…”

  “I won’t…”

  Her nipples already hurt, their hard points chafed by the wet linen, but when his hands reached around to cup and fondle her, they contracted into tight aching buds, shooting arrows of excited painfulness deep between her thighs. Roughly he kneaded the peaks, deliberately arousing her.

  “Let us see how ardently you protest when I bury myself inside you.” He pushed up her wet skirts, exposing her bare thighs. She could feel the cool air on her chilled buttocks, feel his warm fingers between her legs…

  “Niall…plague take you, no!”

  “Yes, sweeting.” His voice was dark velvet. “I’ll not relent until you burn for me, till I feel the pleasure rip through you…”

  His promise made her pulse leap wildly. She could feel the heated length of his sex brand her naked thighs like searing steel, feel the pulsing urgency of his lithe, magnificent body.

  His teeth grazed her ear, his breath coming harsh and hot against her skin as he said, “Even now the fire in your blood burns for release.”

  “Curse you…get…off me!”

  In partial compliance, he arched his body over hers, but instead of freeing her, he lifted her on her hands and knees, rendering her completely vulnerable. Kneeling behind her, he stroked the velvet-sheathed hardness of his arousal against her yielding bottom, making her weak with longing.

  Sabrina fought to hold back a ragged sob of desire. She tensed rigidly as his hand slid between her legs and brushed the tight nest of curls. He found her cleft hot and slick with her own juices, the feminine bud of pleasure throbbing with heat.

  Not allowing her to escape, he thrust two fingers up inside her. Sabrina bit her lip to keep from screaming in excitement.

  “You clench so tightly around my fingers,” he murmured, his voice as dark and seductive as black velvet. “I can’t wait to feel you sheathe my cock.”

  His bold fingers thrust deeper and she moaned, a pleading sound of need, a shameless yearning to be filled and stretched by this man…dominated and possessed…She wanted him, hot and deep and male, inside her.

  She could feel him poised behind her…his fingers parting her honeyed thighs for his taking…the swollen head of his shaft potently probing the silky folds of flesh. When she made one last desperate attempt to pull away, he gripped her buttocks in his strong grasp and in a single rough stroke, plunged to the hilt inside her.

  It was a stunning act of possession, one that almost made her faint with sensation. Sabrina cried aloud at the incredible feel of his fiery spear piercing her, forcing her wide open, a curse spilling from her lips. Yet when he made to withdraw, she braced her palms against the mattress and thrust wildly back against him, impaling herself on his magnificent flesh.

  He laughed, the husky sound raw with triumph and excitement, and swiftly drew back, only to plunge within her again.

  She was panting by the time he’d thrust twice, and groaning by the fifth powerful stroke. He drove fierce and full inside her, ramming himself hard within her, his swollen sacs slapping against her mons. Her senses reeled with the feel of him, while brilliant flames leapt against the blackness of her mind.

  “Oh…God…”

  “Aye, that’s the way of it…Moan for me, tiger…”

  “Sweet mercy…Niall…please…”

  She was dimly aware she was begging, yet she didn’t care. She writhed wantonly at his savage plundering, the wild frenzy building within her as he ravished her so exquisitely. She shook as the brutal, grinding pleasure surged relentlessly, sobbing aloud with sweet, mindless wanting.

  Feeling her shudders, groaning as she trembled tightly around his engorged shaft, Niall drove her ever higher. He was beyond anger, beyond thought, driven by a fierce nameless hunger. He felt her convulsions of ecstasy begin an instant before searing talons of sensation ripped through him. He heard her scream as she shattered, heard his own hoarse shout as his body exploded in an endless, piercing rapture.

  Her flesh continued to pulse sweetly long after the moment of orgasm. Niall felt the faint rippling as he collapsed weakly upon her, felt his heart beating in a frenzied echo of her own.

  When the last faint, delicious spasm was spent, when the madness had receded a little, he withdrew from her and shifted his body, relieving Sabrina of his weight. He was still breathing harshly, his skin still sheened with sweat from the frantic, almost savage urgency of their lovemaking.

  Her silence disturbed him, though.

  Forcing open his eyes, he gave her a searching look. He had marked her as his; her face was dewy from the heat and violence of his possession.

  “Did I hurt you?” he asked thickly.

  “Mortally,” she muttered, her withering tone suggesting that her pride had suffered more than her flesh.

  Her scathing retort relieved him, yet her body was doubtless wet and chilled from his dousing in the loch. Easing himself from the bed, Niall determinedly stripped off her sodden garments and wrapped her in his plaid.

  “I have no intention of remaining abed with you,” Sabrina grumbled in protest as he sat beside her and began combing her wet hair through his fingers.

  “You cannot return home looking like a bedraggled mouse.”

  “You might have considered that before throwing me in the loch to drown.”

  “You deserved it,” Niall retorted, remembering just what had brought them to this point. His jaw clenched.

  “I did not deserve to be ravished!”

  “Come now, admit it.” He bent to nuzzle her bare shoulder with his lips. “You enjoyed every moment.”

  “I shall only admit that you are a bold, arrogant devil!”

  “And you were magnificent in all your fury, dripping like a fish and clawing like a tiger.”

  She turned and struck him, punching his shoulder. The iron-hard muscle didn’t budge.

  With a grim smile, Niall grasped her arms and pinned Sabrina down on her back. When her bare breasts spilled free of the plaid, he nipped a budded peak.

  “Punishment,” he said tauntingly.

  Sabrina arched against the fiery sensation that streaked through her. “Don’t…”

  “Such an obedient, accommodating wife,” he observed mockingly. “So compliant and submissive…”

  She glared up at him. “You have a positive genius for rousing my ire.”

  “And you, my sweet, have a decided knack for rousing me.”

  Releasing her abruptly, Niall rose and began hanging her wet garments before the fire to dry.

  Sabrina watched warily as he removed the rest of his own clothing, then returned to the bed. Despite her obvious reluctance, he joined her beneath his plaid, wrapping them both in the thick wool.

  As he held her naked against him, Sabrina could feel his heat seeping into her frozen limbs. She lay cupped into his body, her throat hurting with the need to c
ry. Niall had demonstrated very aptly how weak she was where he was concerned. He had taken her in anger, and she had submitted with humiliating eagerness. Perhaps he had been swept away momentarily by lust, as she had, but his heart had remained untouched, while she allowed hers to be trampled on like so much dust.

  I don’t want to love him, she thought in despair. Loving him was both reckless and foolish. It left her so terribly vulnerable.

  She raised her fingers to her mouth, still swollen and tender from the violence of his lovemaking. The conflict had not been settled between them, she knew. The tension still remained, dark and palpable.

  She wasn’t mistaken. When Niall at last spoke at her back, his voice held a silken edge of warning. “You are my wife, mouse. I’ll thank you not to forget it.”

  Sabrina stiffened. “I have not forgotten.”

  “Then know this.” His low voice reverberated against the sensitive nape of her neck, making her shiver. “I will never permit you to take Keith Buchanan as your lover.”

  “I don’t want him as my lover. And I’ve given you no grounds to think otherwise! I did not come here for a liaison with him.”

  “Indeed.” His tone was acerbic.

  “I did not! Had you given me the least chance to explain, I would have told you why I came. I wished to discuss peace with him.”

  “Peace?”

  “Yes, peace.” Sabrina held fast to her temper as she raised herself up on one elbow. “There is something peculiar about the accounts we’ve been given of the recent cattle raids—their order, I mean. Keith Buchanan claims his clan did not initiate the first attack, that they would not break a truce after giving their word.”

  Niall made a sound in his throat that was pure scorn.

  “I know…I admit I did not want to believe him at first, either. But Keith swears they did not start the raiding.”

  He gave her a fierce glance. “How can you vindicate the bastards so readily?”

  “I am not vindicating them. I am just trying to discover the truth.”

  Restlessly Niall rolled over on his back, drawing the plaid with him. “The bloody Buchanans are thieves and murderers. You should ken that. They’re to blame for the death of your own father as well as mine.”

  “Indirectly perhaps, but that was an accident. And it was a long time ago.”

  “A Highlander has an excellent memory,” Niall muttered darkly.

  Sabrina bit her lip in frustration. Yet she could not let this opportunity pass without attempting to make Niall view the situation with some degree of objectiveness. He had been enemies with Clan Buchanan for so long that he knew no other way.

  “I can understand why you bear them such hatred,” she said carefully, “but we will never have peace as long as the feud continues.”

  “Then we will never have peace.”

  “I cannot accept that.” Earnestly Sabrina gazed down at him. “Will you not at least talk to them?”

  “No.”

  His stubbornness stung her to fresh anger. “It seems to me that any fool can wield a sword. But it takes a strong leader to resolve differences without bloodshed.”

  Niall scowled up at the smoke-darkened rafters. “You are meddling in affairs you know nothing about.”

  “Well, I am trying to learn.” She ground her teeth in vexation. “I agreed to wed you to save my clan, but ’twill have been for naught if you insist on maintaining your blind hatred. It is madness to continue fighting. As chieftain, Niall, you are the key to settling the feud. The men of Clan Duncan answer to you now. They will follow your lead.” She hesitated. “You’ll think me a stubborn gomeril, I know, but Keith Buchanan seemed sincere.”

  Niall grunted. “I think you are uncommonly gullible. You’ve allowed yourself to be used as a dupe. Meeting him here was the height of folly. The bloody Buchanans would like nothing more than to put horns on me.”

  “Keith Buchanan harbors no feelings of desire for me, I tell you.”

  “I dispute that, lass, but ’tis beside the point. Did it never occur to you that Owen’s kin would gleefully seduce the wife of his foe simply to even the tally with me?”

  It was Sabrina’s turn to scoff. “What would it matter to you if he did cuckold you? Only your pride would suffer.”

  Niall’s eyes narrowed at her. “You’ll not take him for a lover, do you ken me?”

  Realizing the futility of arguing, Sabrina lay back down with a flounce. Her anger smoldering anew, she stared up at the ceiling. “I thought ours was to be a modern marriage, that we would go our separate ways. You shouldn’t care if I took a lover. You never wished for this damnable union, you told me so last night.”

  He frowned. “I said I would consider allowing you a discreet affair once you presented me with heirs—after an appropriate interval. But I’ll not countenance you with a bloody Buchanan.”

  “Very well, then. I promise you, I will choose someone other than a Buchanan when the time comes.”

  Rolling on his side, Niall stared down at Sabrina, his gaze boring into hers. Her foolish insistence on peace annoyed him less than her threat to take other lovers.

  After a moment of strained silence, he reached his hand up to close possessively around her throat, where her pulse beat sure and warm. Inexplicably he was filled with the fierce urge to prove she wanted no lover but him.

  Slowly he trailed his fingers down to cover her bare breast. He felt her nipple tighten, felt the sensual shiver that ran through her body. The same shiver surged through him in a savage stroke of need.

  “Don’t…” she whispered, shutting her eyes.

  “I thought we had settled this,” Niall replied, his jaw hardening. “You’ll not deny me, wife. You’ll not deny yourself…”

  Bending, he covered her lips with his own, pressing his swelling flesh into her soft belly, feeling a grim satisfaction at the helpless moan of surrender Sabrina gave as she twisted against him.

  He made love to her slowly this time, demanding everything she had to give and more, wringing cry after cry of ecstasy from her, refusing to relent until she lay gasping and shuddering and pleading with him for surcease.

  In the heated aftermath, Sabrina sank into an exhausted slumber, but Niall found sleep elusive. He held her in the protection of his embrace, frowning at some vague point in the distance.

  What the devil was happening to him? Sabrina’s interference in clan affairs had sorely vexed him, but that wasn’t what had set his blood to boiling or aroused such intense feelings of fury and betrayal within him.

  Remembering their tempestuous confrontation by the loch, Niall grimaced. He’d been angry enough to strike Sabrina—he who had never touched a lass in anger in his life. In truth, his own conduct dismayed him even more than the rash actions of his gullible young wife. He had behaved like a grasping, jealous husband.

  It had to be jealousy. Mere male pride could not account for his rage when he’d spied Sabrina in Keith Buchanan’s arms. Nor could bitter hatred for an enemy clan explain his covetousness. He would have reacted that way with any man.

  Niall shook his head, wondering how he’d become so obsessed with his own bride. He’d thought his fascination with Sabrina would fade to indifference in time, yet his passions had only grown stronger. The more determined he was to deny his desire, the more fierce his need grew to possess her. Even now he was stunned by the driving urgency he’d felt to brand Sabrina as his alone.

  Absently he fingered a damp tendril of her hair as he contemplated his remarkable madness.

  Jealousy was an alien notion to him. He’d never been so enamored of a woman that he cared if she took other lovers. He’d never felt such primitive possessiveness toward any lass…until Sabrina.

  There was no explanation for the ravenous need she incited in him. Beautiful women had been a constant in his life since adolescence, and he’d managed to elude being snared by any of them. Sabrina was no raging beauty certainly, and yet…she was beautiful when her lustrous eyes flashed with fury,
more beautiful still when he had her naked and hungry beneath him, her skin flushed with desire, her eyes flaming with passion.

  He wanted her beyond reason. She could stir up a maelstrom of need and hunger in him that defied logic. Her body fired his blood in a way no lass’s ever had.

  He hadn’t foreseen that. Sabrina could make the fire in him blaze up till it raged out of control.

  A fierce stab of desire pierced Niall at the memory of their violent coupling a short while ago. They’d mated like animals, and yet she had craved it as much as he, responding to him measure for measure.

  Her passion had shaken him to the core. He’d experienced an explosion of desire he hadn’t felt in years, perhaps not ever.

  Niall’s frown deepened as he raised himself up on one elbow. It was not, however, merely the carnal gratification he found with Sabrina that attracted him. She had insinuated herself into his life against his will. He found himself craving her company. He cherished the closeness and companionship he’d discovered with her. He admired the way she’d stubbornly championed her clan and pressed for peace. Jealousy pricked at Niall again, because all that fire was for her clan, and not for him.

  His eyes darkened as he watched her sleep. How had his plan gone so awry? In turning a prickly mouse into a woman he desired, he had given Sabrina too much power over him. She was like a fever in his blood. Fascination had turned to obsession—and something even more primal. The nameless emotion knotted in his gut, as intense and dangerous as a double-edged sword.

  He pushed it away, scowling.

  Bloody saints, he didn’t like feeling this way…so threatened, so vulnerable. He didn’t like this desperate feeling of need. He was no callow youth to be carried away by passion, letting lust rule his head.

  Faith, but he needed to rid himself of this dangerous madness before he made an even greater fool of himself.

  What he needed was another woman. Another lover. He needed to sate himself with physical pleasure in someone else’s arms, to make him forget his craving for Sabrina, to get her out of his blood.

  He needed to purge himself of his incomprehensible feelings for her, to prove to himself that she had no consuming hold over him.