Reversing their positions, he wedged her legs apart with his knees and guided himself into position, using sweet, blunt pressure to stretch her opening. Mon Dieu, she was tight. So very tight. He would have to be careful not to split her asunder.
He pushed inside by increments, spreading her legs with his weight and fighting the urge to thrust in hard and deep. The effort to hold himself back made his arms tremble, while the blood poured violently in his veins. Rocking forward slightly, he buried his face in the curve of her neck and whispered hotly in her ear.
“Are you ready?”
She did not speak, just hugged him and nodded against his cheek. Justin nuzzled her neck, thrust his tongue into her ear at the same time he rocked forward, pushing in deeper, huge and hot and hard, pulsing with life inside her. She made a small sound, of pleasure, of pain. When he drew back and thrust again, she told him to stop.
“Please,” she begged him, choking on her words. “I want to, but it hurts. It hurts. I don’t know. I thought I could, but there must be something wrong with me.”
I don’t know. I thought I could…?
Mon Dieu! Surely she wasn’t an innocent?
Justin froze on straightened arms and stared into her eyes. “The truth,” he said roughly. “Am I the first?”
She looked at him with tear-filled eyes and nodded.
He held himself suspended, feeling something akin to guilt that he was more than willing to usher her into the world’s oldest profession. “There is nothing wrong with you, ma belle. With the right lover, the hurt soon eases, and then comes pleasure as you have never known. I can give it, if you will let me.”
She looked at him, trying to be brave, wanting to believe.
He kissed her, softly, gently, and whispered against her lips, “Tell me the truth. Do you want this? It’s not too late to change your mind. You’re a comely thing. You could find gainful employment, a husband”—all this said while he was pulsing inside her, dark whispers urging him to spread her, to take her, to ram in deep, absolute possession…while another voice wondered what it would cost him to be her first, her best, her only lover.
Christiana blinked away the sheen of moisture clouding her vision and met his gaze unerringly. “Oui,” she told him, raising her hands to frame his face. Of course she wanted this—wanted him. How could he doubt it, when she’d waited for him all her life?
“It will hurt,” he warned. “No matter how careful I am. I am a large man, and you are so very small….”
“I would think…that would please you,” she whispered, blushing profusely.
“It does, chérie.” The lines of his mouth flattened. “But I regret that I must cause you pain while I experience only pleasure.”
Christiana slid her gloved hands to his chest, measuring its width and feeling the carved slabs of muscle, the beating of his heart, so strong, so sure, so surprisingly tender.
“I forgive you,” she whispered, and, smiling bravely, drew his head down.
Justin lowered his weight as he kissed her, pressing her against the fragrant mattress, seduced by the mingled scents of lavender and her. Angling his head, he drove his tongue into her mouth, thrusting deep, memorizing her taste and the feel of her, lithe and erotic beneath him. Rocking, he pushed inside; her body closed around him like a silken fist, tempting him to go deeper.
“Give me your hands.”
She looked up at him, a silent question in her eyes, then did as he asked, letting her fingers fall back onto his pillow. He covered their smallness with his own large hands, pressing their palms together, sliding his fingers between hers to wrap around the backs. Such a simple thing, yet he’d never done it before, never felt the power flow like it did between the two of them despite the gloves. Joined hand in hand, male to female, her position beneath him was no longer one of submissive acquiescence but half of a unique and elemental partnership.
He pressed his lips to her forehead and smiled down at her.
“Hold on.”
Kissing her again, this time in apology, he gathered his strength and surged forward, swallowing her cry a fractured second later. Taut with strain, he suspended himself above her, inside her, waiting for her to adjust to his possession.
Mon Dieu. So tight. Christ have mercy, it was all he could do not to move. He dropped his head to the pillow; his breath sloughed against the slender column of her neck. Nuzzling her cheek with his lips, he dried her tears, then kissed her eyes, her chin, her forehead. He buried his face in the black cloud of her hair and experimentally arched his back, drawing away only to push slowly in again. She inhaled sharply at his invasion, but after a series of careful forays, she seemed to forget to breathe, just watched him in clouded wonder, caught up in the rush of sensation that rose like a tide between them, chasing away the last vestiges of pain until nothing was left but pleasure for them both.
CHAPTER THREE
“Are you all right?”
Justin whispered huskily against her hair as she lay in his arms, her head resting on his shoulder and her soft cheek pressed against the wall of his chest, where she was threading her gloved fingers through the mat of sweat-dampened curls.
“Oui,” she told him, though he wondered if she truly was. Oh, he’d been gentle with her; no lover could have been more tender in his initiation—and few as masterful in their encore performance. He’d played her body like a fine instrument, making it sing at his touch.
Remembering, he felt the stir of arousal. “Perhaps,” he murmured, “you could stay the night…?”
Her fingers paused at his words. Saying nothing, she pressed her hand to his heart.
The simple action encouraged him. “I’ll pay you well,” he swore. “Whatever it takes—”
She stiffened abruptly, alarmingly, recoiling as if he’d slapped her. She had pushed away and slid off the bed before he could stop her. Instead he sat, stunned, baffled by the change in her and stung by her rejection. Gone was the green-eyed temptress who’d bit his chest when she attained her first peak of pleasure, who had gazed up at him with tears in her eyes and begged him for a second release, and a third. In her place was a stranger in a familiar body, someone he knew by touch but not by name.
She had donned her chemise and was stepping into a petticoat when he caught her arm.
She shook off his hand. “Keep your coin,” she said tightly, tears in her voice. “I don’t want it.”
She collected her scattered articles of clothing and set them in a pile by the chair. Although he said nothing, inwardly he cursed her for making him feel awkward, standing without a stitch while she rolled up her stockings and shoved her heels into her shoes and layered herself before his eyes. He’d be damned if he was going to simply accept rejection by a fledgling whore after he’d given her the best she could possibly hope for.
When she broke from her task to glance at him, he swung his arm and pointed at the stained bed sheets. “My brother tells me that virgin’s blood costs, whether it be real or fake,” he said viciously, frustrated that their encounter meant more to him, a veteran of many, than to her, who’d never known a man. “Why would you give it freely when I’m willing to pay?”
She glared at him, then began fastening her stomacher. “Let’s just say I wanted you to be first, all right?”
If she thought that bit of flattery was going to satisfy him, she’d better think again. He wasn’t about to let her leave until he found out who the hell she was and why her blood was smeared on his thighs. People said things in anger, and since money seemed to be the point that pricked her most, he used it.
“Here,” he snarled, grabbing his justacorps and fishing a coin from his pocket to toss on the table. “Buy a new cloak, if nothing else.”
She looked up. Her mouth dropped open and something like laughter escaped—except it held no humor. “I don’t want your money.” She tried to fasten her hooks remaining by feel, her green eyes never leaving his, accusation shining amidst the suspicious gleam of moisture. “I do
n’t need your money. My God, to think—”
She bit it off, typically female, refusing to clue him in on the source of her vexation as she reached for her tattered cloak. Realizing that in another minute she’d be gone, he moved to stop her, but she plucked her weighty réticule off the chair and let him have it, aiming where it would hurt the most and bruising his hip when he turned in time. The stitching broke on impact. A hail of gold doubloons showered his feet and the floor, rolling drunkenly for long, drawn-out seconds, until the last one accelerated and fell flat, leaving the room oddly quiet.
She’d been truthful about one thing, at least. She didn’t need his money.
“Now look what you’ve done!” she hissed, adding insult to injury. She had the gall to glare at him as if it were his fault.
“What I’ve done?” he repeated, his voice cold enough to freeze over hell. “Think again, mademoiselle. You came to me, dressed like one more everlasting daughter of Eve in a place that’s full of them. Of your own free will, you followed me to this room. My private room. What was I to think?” he demanded, crossing his arms with soft menace.
Before she could catch herself, she brushed a glance across his groin. Flustered by his natural reaction, she looked away, her cheeks as red as the heels of her shoes.
Justin smiled sourly. “That’s right. I am a man. I think like a man—and I reacted like any other man would have, given the situation. It wasn’t rape,” he reminded her tightly.
And it wasn’t just sex, either. He’d known enough women to understand that something special had happened between them. He just didn’t know quite what to make of it or where to go from here.
“No.” She had to focus on the floor to admit it. “The blame is mine. I should have insisted that we talk downstairs.” She glanced up. “You will recall, I said I had business to discuss. There’s a man being held in Port Royal for trial. I would see him freed, and I need your help.”
Justin fought back the urge to voice his opinion of the kind of man who would send a sacrificial virgin to do his bidding. If anything, he deserved to rot in prison…with the French pox.
He knew which part he’d like to see drop off first.
Clutching the ruined réticule in a small, gloved hand, she pointed at the gold coins showering the floor. “That is why I came. To hire your services.”
A small fortune, he estimated, dismissing the temptation to throw it out with her. He had a ship and crew to consider, and it wouldn’t be the first time he had broken someone out of a British prison.
Justin rubbed the tension knotting the back of his neck and blew out softly. “What are the charges?”
“Piracy.” She slanted a look at him. Inscrutable.
“Is he guilty?”
She shook her head vehemently. “Ian O’Malley is a smuggler, not a pirate.” Her stubborn chin came up. “I believe you know him.”
Again those green eyes, challenging him to remember. “I do.” He nodded slowly. “Ian was a queer Irishman, preferred women to whiskey. We sailed together years ago. I remember him as a decent sort—if overly indulgent with that demon-child nephew of his.”
When she bristled at the criticism, Justin stroked the scar on his cheek. “Gave me this, the lad did, when I sought to punish him for thievery. He was fortunate he had his uncle’s pistol to hide behind, else I’d gladly have wielded the lash and he’d have had his own marks on his backside for his crimes against me.”
Taking satisfaction in her sudden pallor, Justin allowed himself to smile grimly. “Ian and I had been the best of friends but we parted ways that day. Tell me, then, why should I risk my neck—and those of my crew—to aid in his escape?”
The question threw her. “I—b-because he’s innocent,” she stammered. “He was framed for an act he didn’t commit. Caught with goods he’d won at cards and arrested on the ‘evidence’ they found. Now he sits in Port Royal, waiting to stand trial.” The color rose in her cheeks and she squared her slim shoulders, gloved hands clenched in fists at her sides. “You know as well as I, there will be no British justice for Ian O’Malley!” she spat. “And I’ll not see him swing for another’s deed!”
“But why risk coming here?” he demanded to know. “Who is Ian, to mean so much to you?” Just what kind of hold did the Irishman have on this spitfire who’d come prepared to do anything for him?
“That, Captain Vallé, is none of your concern. This is what matters.” She pointed to the gold doubloons spilled on the floor. Unless he missed this mark as badly as he’d misjudged the wench, the amount was his price for such a mission when he commanded the Raptor, a thirty-gun frigate as sleek and fast as any plying these waters.
But Ian O’Malley was being held on land—British-held, at that—a situation calling for different stratagems. Wanting to hurt her as much as she’d disappointed him, Justin shook his head, his queue brushing the width of his naked shoulders. “Not enough, I am afraid. Prison breaks require bribes as well as extra planning. There’s hardly enough here to make it worth my while.”
Christiana bit her lip, hating the sting in her eyes, denying the tears she refused to shed. The gold at Vallé’s feet represented everything she owned, everything she’d been able to beg and borrow above what O’Malley’s crew had given freely. But tallying the doubloons, she weighed them against what O’Malley meant to her and found them lacking, too.
“I regret,” she whispered, shuddering from an unnatural coldness, “this is all I have.”
Vallé cursed aloud, condemned himself for seven times the fool. He should toss her out on her pretty backside and good riddance. Instead, he demanded a reason why he should attempt O’Malley’s rescue.
She looked at him through tear-misted eyes and said simply, “He is all I have. The reason I survived when so many others did not. You remember….”
She took off her gloves, the ones she’d worn all night, and let him see the scar on her finger. In one, awful moment, the past came crashing back with a vengeance, and he saw with glaring clarity what had always been before his eyes.
She nearly smiled. “Ironic, is it not, that you have known him longer? O’Malley was impressed, carried off by the British before he had the chance to be a husband and father. I was eight years old when he found me.” She’d been traveling with her convict-mother in a ship’s belly full of transported Irish indentured servants bound for the American colonies when a sloop approached, flying a distinctive black flag, its death’s head, heart, and horizontal bone marking it as Stede Bonnet’s. The second the cry of “pirates” was raised, her mother made her hide, warned her not to make a sound, no matter what.
Christiana was an obedient child, used to being quiet when her mother entertained visitors—mostly sailors who came to the shack they currently called home and left coins enough that they didn’t starve, at least. But the sounds that disturbed her dreams as she slept on the cold dirt of the kitchen floor were nothing to that waking nightmare of horror and death aboard the Bess. She’d bit her fist until it bled, listened to the sounds of slaughter, smelled the sickening sweet stench of blood. Thinking of the hushed stories bandied about late at night, she’d wondered if she shouldn’t come out and die quickly, rather than burn to death when the ship was fired to hide the crime.
She was praying for help when another person came, a man who cried her mother’s name and dropped heavily to his knees beside her mother’s body. Grasping at the lifeline he represented, she emerged from beneath the woolen coverlet…only to lock gazes with his anguished eyes. Green eyes that were a mirror image of her own.
He was handsome enough, sun-weathered and shabby clothed, with black hair that was straight and glossy, while hers held a hint of her mother’s unruly auburn curls. When she’d reached to touch them one last time, he had introduced himself. Ian O’Malley, he’d said, and he’d known this woman in his youth.
My mother, she’d choked out past a throat bottled with tears. Her mother, forever lost to her.
“He came too late t
o save maman, but he promised to take care of me, if I did everything he said. He cut off my braid. Found boy’s clothes to go with my new name, before dragging me above deck and taking me back to the Revenge.”
They had boarded Bonnet’s sloop to the mad cackle of laughter and pitiful pleas for mercy. A board had been placed on the far side, and walking it was the unfortunate captain of the Bess, a cousin-in-law of Stede Bonnet’s who had introduced Bonnet to his eternally nagging wife. The planter-turned-pirate refused to spare him, swearing that now he would know what it felt like to walk down the aisle with a shark waiting at the end.
O’Malley had caught her in his arms and turned her head to his chest, hiding her eyes and crooning until the frenzied sound of feeding stopped.
Vallé smiled darkly. “He sacrificed his dignity to keep you safe. Pretended a fondness for pretty boys and claimed you for his portion of the prize.”
That stubborn chin snapped up, and she glared at him. “Only one man aboard the Revenge was trusted with anything close to the truth. Someone who saw our resemblance and guessed we were related. You, Justin Vallé! The day I cut myself nearly to the bone, you heard me cry and ran to help me. I wanted my mother, and you came, and I hated you for it. I cursed you, and you went still as death, then—what was it you said? Something like, you have his eyes, don’t you, brat?”
“You were a brat,” he growled, daring her to deny it.
“Some of the time,” Christiana was forced to admit. “But no nephew. You and O’Malley were friends, but the day I borrowed your knife and did this,” she said, holding up her hand, “I wanted my mother. My mother. I railed at you and at O’Malley. I blamed you both for not saving her. The day I lost my mother was the day I found my father. I will not lose him, too.”
Touch the Wind: Touch the Wind Book 1 Page 3