by Faye Avalon
He’d been careful to keep his hips away from her, to avoid his manhood pressing into her back. But he wanted her closer now. So close that she would not be able to mistake his intention. They would join this day. There would be no more games, no more delays.
He’d anticipated her gasp when he pressed against her, what he hadn’t anticipated was the intensity he felt as his tip touched her skin. For a moment he couldn’t catch his breath. It felt as if his lungs had been wrung out. When Lahna gasped again, he realized he’d been pressing hard against her back.
Drawing back a little, he slid his hands around her waist and cupped her breasts. She whimpered, then moaned, arching her neck so that her throat was fully exposed. He pressed his mouth to the spot just below her ear, raised his mouth to catch the lobe between his teeth.
Her hands covered his as he fondled her breasts. She started moving her hips, rotating her pelvis in miniscule circles but enough to drive him mad. He felt dizzy, the way he felt when receiving a momentary blow to the head in battle. Needing to steady himself, he planted his feet farther apart and rocked his hips in time to her undulations.
Her fingers had been tentative against the back of his hands, but now they dug in, coaxing him to squeeze her breasts harder. He obliged, and earned himself another little murmur of pleasure.
Dazedly, he realized that those tiny moans she gave were more carnal than the outright screams of pleasure he had often elicited from previous lovers. In response, his cock throbbed.
Anchoring her firmly around the waist, he slid his free hand down the front of her body until it disappeared beneath the surface. She gasped when his palm covered her belly, gasped again as he slid a finger into her folds.
He pushed a little more, pressed his mouth firmly to her throat. Once more her hands covered his, but this time the one against her center attempted to pull his hand away.
“Lahna.” He wasn’t ready to accept that she might not want this. “Let me have you.”
“I… I want to know you this way,” she said a little breathlessly. “But I am confused. And … and a little afraid.”
He drew back a little, but left his palm pressed against her heat. “Of what?”
She swallowed, her throat contracting delicately. “You have had many lovers, but I have had none.”
Could that be true? Or was she simply using her countless wiles to throw him off balance again? He had a feeling she wasn’t being entirely honest with him. “I will take care with you,” he offered, wondering if the tension that had moved into her luscious body was also feigned. “There is no reason for you to be afraid.”
Turning her head to face him, she blinked. In that moment, he saw her innocence. He was still not convinced that she wasn’t a plant by the king, but he could easily believe that she was indeed inexperienced in the ways of bodily pleasure. Virginal. Untouched.
He couldn’t fathom why the king would send a virgin to seduce him. Were there not other more experienced temptresses that the king could call upon? But perhaps that was exactly the tyrant’s plan. Send a virgin, throw Caelan off the scent. Had the king counted on the bewitching Lahna seducing the Limani prince with her innocence? Lulling him into a falseness that would have him spill his innermost desires and plans to her? Had he even counted on Caelan offering Lahna a proposal of marriage?
Discounting that last concern, Caelan deepened his hold on Lahna. The king would not allow one of his concubines to become the property of another man. Not even for the purposes of eliciting valuable information.
But Caelan couldn’t quite dismiss the feeling that all was not as it seemed.
His father’s warning rang clear, reminding him to keep his brain fully involved in proceedings. He had to keep control in his dealings with this woman. But while he was confident his head could remain engaged, his body was an entirely different matter. He wanted her with an overwhelming need. A need so great that he thought he might combust if he didn’t find relief in her soft, warm body. And soon.
Slowly, he slid his finger inside her again, pleased when she softened her grip on his hand. “I will not hurt you,” he whispered against her ear. “I wish only to give you pleasure.”
Her head fell lightly against his shoulder again, and she made that tiny sound in her throat. The hand that had gripped onto his as he pushed inside her rose to grip the ledge. She pushed her backside against him, lifted her hips a little so that his cock pressed against her crease.
Now the only sound came from him. A long throaty groan as her delicious rear hugged his cock.
Keep control, he reminded himself. Stay vigilant. He needed to keep his plans uppermost in his mind, and the reasons for them. He had to wed her and keep her under his command.
“I like when you touch me,” she said softly. “I think I would enjoy touching you.”
His knees almost buckled at the thought of Lahna’s hands floating over his hard length. Of her taking him into her mouth.
The witch. Was she after making him lose complete control? He fought hard to remember the reason for his seduction. The reason she was useful to him.
“Consent,” he ground out, biting down gently on her ear as he continued to slide his finger slowly in and out of her folds. “Be my wife, Lahna. Agree to be mine and allow me the delight of pleasuring you like this in our marriage bed.”
She didn’t answer him for long moments, but her hips continued to undulate against him. Caelan’s chest felt tight, almost as if he couldn’t get enough air. When he was on the verge of demanding she answer him, she let out a long sigh. “I consent,” she said softly. “To becoming your wife.”
He wasn’t sure what emotions stormed through him, but he decided to err on the side of relief and triumph. He whipped her around so that her back was to the ledge.
Her eyes were huge and guileless, and for a moment he was lost in their depths. “Rumors abound about the woman I have ensconced in my private quarters,” he said with a small smile. “My people will no doubt be relieved to know that she is to become my bride.”
Her look turned to one of apprehension, leading Caelan to consider that she was concerned about her untouched state. Hadn’t she told him that she was a little afraid? Perhaps it was time to assure her that their marriage bed would entail only pleasure.
Leaning down, he let his mouth hover close to hers so that their breaths mingled and the scents of arousal filled the air. She swallowed, then her tongue came out to moisten her lower lip.
“How you tempt me, my bride,” he said, letting his hands stroke soothingly down her arms. “Allow me to show you a little of the pleasure that awaits us both.”
His hands dipped into the water and gripped her hips. He hoisted her easily up onto the ledge. She gasped and reached for him, keeping her hands on his shoulders as he pulled her forward until her hips were at the edge. Moving between her legs, he kept his eyes on hers. Plenty of time for feasting his fill of her nakedness when she lost the tension that had moved into her body.
Even as he thought it, she relaxed a little, her hands sliding to his upper arms and digging in. “Do other people visit this place?” she asked, looking over his shoulder past the waterfall that shielded them like a curtain. “What if they see us?”
The skittish look in her eyes made him smile. “It is too far for most people to venture,” he said, moving closer between her legs. “Besides which, it is considered the property of the royal court, which means that we are certain to remain completely alone, my bride.”
He tested her readiness to move forward by placing his hands on her thighs and moving them wider apart. She watched him closely and, unable to resist any longer, Caelan glanced down. She was bare, he realized with a jolt, then reasoned that she had likely been made so in preparation for her life in the king’s harem. Rumor had it that the lecherous bastard preferred his women as girls. Chaste and untouched.
A fire raged in Caelan’s insides, anger piercing his chest. Lahna would never belong to the king. She was his. Caela
n’s. She would be his bride, his consort, his lover. That monster would never touch her. Something wild and fierce stormed through him.
“You are displeased?”
Her words broke him from the fury that had taken hold, and he hadn’t realized his fingers were digging into Lahna’s thighs until she winced. “No, I am not displeased,” he said, acknowledging that she had seen the direction of his gaze.
Her face flushed a pretty pink, but she said nothing else.
Sliding his hands along her thighs as if to soothe, he leaned forward and took her mouth with his. His hands moved over her hips, past her waist until he could cup her breasts. He drew his thumbs slowly over the tight buds, pleased when she rocked gently into his hold.
She broke the kiss, her eyes a dreamy green, her black lashes floating over them. She arched her head back and thrust her breasts forward.
Caelan wasn’t a man to miss any opportunity when it presented itself so readily. Leaning forward, he covered her breast with his mouth, teasing the peak with his tongue until Lahna made those sounds again.
He took his time, moving from one breast to the other. Teasing. Provoking. Tasting.
When he looked up, Lahna’s head was arched back, her hands bracing behind her and holding her steady on the ledge. Caelan held her around the waist and eased her back until she lay against the slab.
Her eyes remained closed, her mouth slightly open. Her breath was uneven, causing her breasts to undulate erotically. He moved forward, spreading her open even more. With his thumbs he opened her to him, her pretty pink slit so wet and ready for him.
He slid a finger along her wetness, pressing his free hand to her thigh when she tried to close her legs. “Allow me to give you pleasure,” he said, feeling the need to clear his throat. “Give yourself up to me.”
She squeezed her eyes closed now, and Caelan wasn’t sure if it was from sensation or from embarrassment. He needed to keep uppermost that this was perhaps her first time with a man, and since he was no brute he would take his time regardless of his own driving need and would make it memorable, and pleasurable, for her.
Her breath came faster now and he slid in deeper, adding another finger to increase the pressure. She bucked her hips, arched her neck, and cried out.
Leaning down, he pressed his mouth to her heat. Her scent rose up, maddening him, so that when the first taste of her settled on his tongue his body screamed to have her. To make her his.
Lahna’s intimate muscles tensed around him. Still, Caelan wasn’t certain if it was from arousal or from shock. All he knew was that he needed to taste her, pleasure her, make her see that he was the only man who could ever give her such satisfaction.
“I… I…” She gasped, her hips moving beneath his mouth, her hands reaching out toward him as if to grasp onto him. “Oh… Caelan…”
His name on her lips shot him even higher toward a kind of erotic madness that lingered between the earth and the heavens. Driven by a craving that ripped away his reasoning powers, she became the center of his universe. His only desire was to take, and to give.
He knew the moment Lahna tipped over the edge, but he didn’t stop. He couldn’t. The taste of her was like the most decadent drug, more potent and dangerous than an arrow filled with hallucinatory substances that could render a man delirious.
He continued to plunder her heat, driving his tongue along her wetness until she screamed for him to stop. He didn’t, for now he knew that her cries were born of pleasure, of passion.
Only when she had reached another peak, and her body had subsided from the force of her release, did he raise his head and look at her. Gods, but she was like a delicious feast. Her ripe, plumb orbs exactly the right size for his hands, his mouth. Her delicious core exactly right for his tongue … his cock.
Unable to wait any longer, he hooked his hands beneath her knees and drew her body closer to the edge of the slab. He raised his hips, anchored one of her thighs with one hand, and used the other to guide his cock to her entrance.
Mindful of her innocence, and thanking the gods he had enough sanity left to remember that, he nudged the tip of his erection to her heat.
He looked up. “Open your eyes,” he ordered softly, waiting until she did so. “Keep your eyes on mine.”
****
Lahna’s senses were aflame. Her whole body felt as if someone had turned a switch inside her and everything had come alive. Powerless. She was powerless to resist.
She couldn’t believe what Caelan had done to her. She could barely believe her response. At the first touch of his hands to her nakedness, she had surrendered. Had allowed her body to become his to do with as he pleased. She had wanted him so very badly. Had wanted to know what it would be like to be deflowered by a man such as Caelan. A potent, virile warrior who made her heart race and her body sing.
When he had hoisted her onto the ledge and spread her legs wide, she had thought to die of embarrassment. She couldn’t believe that it was entirely proper for a man to look at her that way. But then he had frowned and she knew what he had seen. Only a woman promised to the king’s harem required such bodily preparation. Lahna remembered with shame how the women of the king’s court had prepared her in such a way.
But then he had told her he was not displeased, and he had kissed her so sweetly that she had believed him. After the first touch of his fingers to the place between her legs, she had closed her eyes. She didn’t think it was entirely proper for him to see that she found it quite so pleasurable. The peak of her pleasure came so fast. But then he leaned down and kissed her in her most intimate place. Oh, she hadn’t known such delight. His tongue did outrageous things to her, making her writhe and twist. She had squeezed her eyes so tightly against the sensations flooding through her. But then she had reached that peak again. And again.
Now, at his command, she opened her eyes and looked into his. His lids were half closed, but the fiery blue pierced her and made her insides turn with a kind of wicked anticipation … and excitement. He gripped beneath her knees, pulled her forward, and held down her thigh, guiding his manhood to where he had pleasured her.
She squeezed her eyes shut again, for she feared what was to come. The old women had told of the pain maidens endured when first with a man. But Caelan’s gentle but firm tone edged through the fear.
“Look at me, Lahna.”
She gazed into hot blue, lost herself momentarily in the sharp desire she saw there. The tip of him touched her, hot and wet, and her stomach muscles braced in preparation for his possession. Instead of the harsh entrance she had anticipated, he moved slowly, easing himself inside her, inch by inch. Each time she winced he stopped, waited.
Lahna saw that he fought to breath steadily, his muscular chest rising and falling, all the time watching to gauge the moment when she was ready for him to continue.
It was such a strange and uncomfortable feeling. He felt really large and her channel felt very small and narrow. She swallowed, tensing against the next invasion that made pain shoot sharp and fast through her pelvis.
“Ahh…”
Lahna panted, trying to capture her breath and willing the pain to subside. But it already was, and surely he had to be fully inside her now. For certain, she couldn’t imagine there was any more of him to take. He felt so huge, but when he moved a little, it was … quite lovely.
The tension she had been holding dissipated beneath the rhythmic movement of Caelan inside her. Slow, long strokes of his manhood set up blisteringly enjoyable sensations inside her, and she moved her hips in time to his, reaching for more of the pleasure he would give her.
When Caelan shifted, moving his manhood at a slight angle before he began to pump faster, harder, Lahna’s breath caught anew. She panted so hard she felt sure that she might lose consciousness. Everything swam, pulsed, rocked, and it was so much more intense than anything she had enjoyed so far.
Again, she soared, completely lost to anything but the feel of Caelan inside her and the incred
ible sensations slamming through her body.
She wanted to close her eyes again, to simply go with what was happening, but she wanted to see Caelan. To watch him, see his own reaction to what they shared. Braced above her, his jaw tight, lips slightly open so she could see he clenched his teeth. His own eyes were barely open, but they were latched on hers.
He thrust fast and hard, his muscles taut with the effort, and every movement stole her breath away, forcing her to snatch in what little air she could manage. The only sounds she heard were her own heady panting and Caelan’s groans, but then he tensed above her, threw his head back and shoved hard. He emptied inside her, the heat and ferocity of his release making her gasp even as her own pleasure reached another summit.
She clenched around him, loving the feel of him so deep inside and not wanting it to end. But it did and Caelan stilled, closed his eyes, and sucked in lungfuls of breath.
Lahna tried to steady her own breathing, watching him closely and willing him to open his eyes, smile at her, and kiss her gently.
But when he did look at her, there was no smile, no tender kiss. Instead, he pulled out of her, straightened, and drew her up to sit.
“Are you cold?”
She hadn’t thought of it until then. Just as she had been unaware of the thunder of the waterfall, the cheerful singing of the birds, the rustle of the breeze in the tall trees, and … the potential consequences of what they had just done.
Parsley herb, she thought, to make into a brew. Cotton root bark to chew on. They were what the old women had talked of. Remedies that would help prevent a man’s seed from taking hold. She needed to gather both and protect herself.
Caelan came to her holding his tabard and proceeded to wipe the cloth across her shoulders, her arms, her back. He eased her off the ledge, took her hand, and led her out of the pool to where her discarded clothes lay.
Saying nothing, he picked up her simple shift and held it out. Unable to meet his gaze, Lahna dutifully raised her arms and he slipped it over her body. Suddenly she felt more exposed than she had lying naked on the ledge while Caelan had touched her so intimately.