Timely Defense

by Nathalie Gray

  With surprising ease, he slid inside, only by a finger or so, then pulled out so he could resume his former activity and rub her distended pearl with his shaft. Pleasure was building up. Marion curled her spine in what she hoped would be an inviting fashion.

  His hands on her backside dug in. “Marion, if you want this to be gentle, you have to stop torturing me.”

  A sense of power engulfed her. That she could so easily overwhelm such a strong man made her feel feminine and strong but more precisely, it made Marion feel important. To him.

  Sir Ayjay slid in again, deeper.

  Marion was about to voice her encouragement when a surprising stab of sexual gratification poked her in the belly, flared outward, engulfed her sex and distended backside.

  “Ohh…”

  And when he entered her, this time with a precise but sharp thrust, Marion cried out. His large hands encircled her waist, even bunched her dress so he could use the fistfuls of wool as counterpoints to the movement of his hips. She hadn’t expected the depth of rapture this unusual—wickedly so—position would bring. Despite his warning, Marion couldn’t help curving her backside up, bucking back against his hard belly. A cry rose to her lips again, one she tried to suppress. Failed miserably. As if spurred by her vocal support, Sir Ayjay added force to his push.

  “Marion, damn, damn,” he snarled as he drove in deep. She felt the wool of his hose rubbing against the back of her thighs.

  “Take me, take me,” she heard herself groan to her complete shock and embarrassment. Where had this all come from, this sudden urge, this frenzy?

  A pronounced tilt of his hips made her arch back, another moan of bliss escaping her. She couldn’t even control herself!

  He did take her. To the jagged peaks of ecstasy, up beyond to the stars to heaven itself. Marion groaned her satisfaction, she cried it out and murmured it into the grass under her. And while Sir Ayjay worked his delicious body into hers, joined their flesh and bodies, all she could do, wanted to do, was receive his skills and hope it’d never end. He’d been right. It was very good.

  After a particularly deep and powerful thrust that raised her knees off the ground, Sir Ayjay stilled. Yet there were no pulsations to indicate he’d released. Had he found no pleasure?

  “Have you—”

  He’d just flipped her on her back by the crook of a knee. Marion rolled over, pulled her dress up to make some room between her knees. Some lady she’d become!

  “You thought I was finished, huh?” he teased, panting, his agile mouth doing wonders to the inside of her knee.

  “I must admit…I did.”

  He smiled his predatory grin again. “Not nearly, my dear. Not with you.”

  Knowing pleasure beyond words would soon ravage her body, Marion spread her knees as wide as they’d go and reached down so she could touch his chest, his sculpted belly, attention he repaid with a thumb over her throbbing pearl. Marion had to lie back down where she writhed without one stitch of awkwardness. And to say she’d only been intimate with the man once before. What was he making of her?

  “Is that good?” he asked, knowing full well the answer. “Huh?”

  Marion nodded.

  Without further ado, he scooped her up over his lap and took her.

  The depth of his initial thrust felt cordial enough and she realized he hadn’t pushed as deeply or as hard as he probably wished. Given his size, he was being ever careful. Thoughtful man. Although Johannes had always been tender with her, she’d heard tales of how men could be very brutal in bed.

  Sir Ayjay grimaced when he sank deeper. “Ahh. I’m close, Marion.”

  “Let it come,” she replied through her teeth. Good Lord, she wanted him to make love to her in every way possible.

  Wrapping his muscled arm over one of her thighs, he straightened her leg so it would stand up against his chest while her other he wrapped around his middle. Muscles banded, he tilted his hips forward, took her more deeply.

  Fire lanced at her belly. Marion let out a long whimper of rapture, which seemed to bolster Sir Ayjay. Biting his bottom lip, he pushed in, this time in a swift and profound thrust that tore a cry from her. He froze instantly, looked worried.

  “More,” she murmured through her teeth. Lord she wanted more. More!

  She’d become insatiable in the span of a few days. Dreams of Sir Ayjay peopled her dreams, plagued her nights, while her days were spent gazing at him in wonderment and desire. Her Norman lord really had changed her, in ways he didn’t even know.

  Unlike his penetration from behind, he wasn’t holding back now. Still clutching her leg upright against him, he twisted hard against her, stretched her sex, distended her channel until she thought the fire would burn her whole, but instead of pain, exquisite fulfillment spread through her. Another wave loomed over her. It darkened her vision. Stars popped behind her eyelids. And while Sir Ayjay shoved himself in, in a sudden and powerful sequence of burning stabs, Marion reached down on either side of her and grabbed at the grass. Anchored more solidly, she withstood his ferocious lovemaking. Each potent drive forced a keen from her.

  “More,” she urged. She didn’t care what this made of her. She wanted Sir Ayjay to crush her to him, wanted him violently.

  Leaning forward, he trapped her leg over his shoulder, the other pinned beneath his great weight then bent until his face loomed over hers. His eyes never leaving hers, he retracted then bore down, using his considerable stamina and vigor to extort shameless cries of fulfillment from her. His deep voice joining hers, he pushed in, branding, claiming, crushing her until his face twisted in the throes of pleasure, he abruptly pulled out and climaxed in the grass beside her. Marion unhooked her leg from around his shoulder and let him arrange himself.

  With a long sigh, he collapsed beside her and rolled onto his back. His member still pointed proudly.

  When she could talk again, Marion cleared her throat and tried to fight the grin tugging at her lips. He twisted his neck to look at her and smiled himself.

  “Your ways are peculiar, Sir Ayjay, but very…pleasurable.” She felt herself blush.

  “I aim to please. You should see what I can do with some strawberries and honey. Mm-mm.”

  The image of how he’d use these foods—in even more wicked ways, undoubtedly—made Marion want to fan herself. Perhaps they should try this some day.

  He plucked a blade of long grass and brought it to his lips. The way he pensively chewed on it made her wonder about the chain of thought occupying him. What sort of life had Sir Ayjay left behind, she wondered.

  “You must miss your home terribly.”

  He shrugged, which made his proud shaft bobbed gently. Though it didn’t seem to want to relent anytime soon. “Well, yeah, I do, but at the same time, I don’t miss the stress, the traffic, oh and all those cell phones. Plus, not many people will notice I’m gone anyway.”

  She had no idea what any of these words meant, but he did seem as though he missed none of them.

  “Shall your friends not wonder what happened to you? Shall your people not wonder where their lord has gone?”

  “Oh that’s right, the Norman Lord thing, pfft! They’ll wonder only when my parking spot stays empty. They’ll be so damn glad to park near the door. They won’t miss me.”

  “Shall they not? I cannot believe this. Surely they shall miss you.” I would.

  “Nah. I don’t have that sort of friends.” He suddenly looked as if the notion bothered him. Or pained him. He arched back so he could look into her face. “This feels like a vacation…only a fool would miss work. Plus, there’s excellent company here.”

  The lascivious grin with which he graced her made her swallow hard. “I shall endeavor to make your stay here as pleasant as possible, Sir Ayjay.”

  “Don’t worry for me, I’ll be fine.” He rolled onto his elbows and transferred the blade of grass from one corner to the next. With his tongue alone. Heat like a fever reached her cheeks.

  Already? She�
�d just lain with the man only moments ago. Her sex still throbbed, for goodness sake!

  “You though, you worry me.”

  “How so?” she asked, unsure if the sudden look of interest she saw in his eyes bode well for her or not.

  “Well, there’s the little matter of The Right Honorable Minister Tightbutt chewing at your heels.”

  Such a vile tongue on a man so handsome!

  He reached out so he could run his knuckles on her cheek. The mark had faded but not the sting of shame it’d brought with it. Matheus had slapped her in front of everyone. The brute!

  “What are you going to do about him?”

  It was her turn to shrug. She rolled onto her belly as well, formed a steeple with her hands and rested her chin on it. By her side, Sir Ayjay leaned sideways so he could kiss her shoulder. So affectionate. So skilled. What woman wouldn’t want to spend the rest of her life with such a man?

  You must ask him.

  The frightening task ahead blew icy breaths down her neck. What if he said no? Then again, what if he said yes?

  “I saw that same look yesterday, right before you slapped me,” Sir Ayjay remarked casually. Yet she could feel the tension coiling between them and hated it.

  Marion had never been one to shy away from responsibility. She took a long breath. “Sir Ayjay, we have met only recently and you are not attached to this region.”

  She felt him stiffen beside her. “It sounds like a Dear John letter.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “Not important, go on.”

  “Well, I know you are not from this region and nothing keeps you here. You are free to leave as you wish of course—”

  “Just say it, Marion.”

  The hard tone didn’t bode well for her question.

  “Should I marry, Lord Matheus would have no choice but to leave me alone.”

  Sir Ayjay’s eyes flared wide. He snorted in laughter, seemed to rethink her comment then grimaced. “Argh, hell, Marion, please don’t. It’s not right. I can’t… I can’t.”

  She nodded, even if inside she wanted to cry and hide her face in shame. To ask a man to marry her and be refused… A woman shouldn’t have to ask this of a man. She never should’ve considered it and faced her trouble head-on instead. Already she regretted involving a foreign lord in her affairs. But this rebuttal felt like a blade across her heart. Making sure her chin didn’t shake—she wanted to cry—Marion nodded.

  “Of course, I understand completely.”

  “I don’t think you do,” he replied, spitting out the blade of grass.

  Kneeling, he wrestled his garments on, fumbled with the belt before finally managing to pull himself together.

  Marion did the same, rearranged her dress and hair. Her hands shook. So did his, for that matter.

  “I’m not the marrying kind,” he began, spat something in his language before grabbing her by the shoulders and putting his face very near. She kept her gaze stubbornly away from his. No need to see the scorn in his eyes on top of making a fool of herself.

  “Please, Marion, look at me.”

  She did, noticed how no scorn shone in the dark eyes but misery. This surprised her.

  “I don’t belong here. I can’t get involved in something like this. It’d change a whole bunch of things, screw everything up. But I’ll find a way to get him off you, okay. This, I promise. We could go to your husband’s family and make our case. I can do that. I’ll do everything I possibly can to help you keep Sargans. I just can’t marry you, Marion.”

  She nodded.

  Yet the sting of rejection didn’t fade.

  Chapter Seven

  Damn his chin itched. Shaving with a knife wasn’t fun. Oh they called it a razor, he called it a knife, a big, honking hunter’s knife he’d had to put to his own throat. The thing was sharp though, at least. With a bit of help from a blushing maid—weren’t they all—he’d managed not to gouge himself. Good thing he didn’t have sensitive skin.

  Never mind a horse, I’d give my kingdom for a razor!

  Twelfth century Europe…

  He still couldn’t wrap his brain around it. Nor could he think about Marion’s request that he marry her for real without having a bad case of the cold feet. The pain in her eyes when he’d said no. What jerk would say no to such curvy little goddess?

  A chicken-shit bastard with no balls, that’s who!

  He threw a sneaky peek at her as they rode toward Earl Asswipe’s estate. Damn, she was beautiful! And brave.

  A.J. couldn’t imagine asking something so personal and being turned down. It must have hurt like nothing else. He’d be too much of a coward to ask himself even if he did want to marry her. Which he of course didn’t. Right?

  Right?

  The thought of their spending the rest of their lives together should’ve scared him into packing his bags—which he didn’t have—and heading for the road—which he didn’t know. But no, nothing. No fear, no feeling of having a choker around his neck. Did it mean he was considering it but too stupid to know? But how could he marry Marion? He didn’t belong. He was from somewhere else. Some time else!

  What a cluster fuck!

  Someone somewhere was having a lot of fun at his expense. Maybe it was some sort of demented reality television show? Hell knew there were a lot of those around.

  Tune in folks as we watch a lawyer slowly lose his mind when he wakes from a crash to find himself in what he thinks is medieval Switzerland. Sound of applause and canned laughter. Don’t miss next week’s episode—surgery without anesthesia!

  A.J. chanced another quick peek at his companions as they rode to meet Baronet Woman Beater of Pouffyland for supper. Marion wore a stunning high-collared, long-sleeved indigo dress, and Hugo his usual medieval dude apparel and that big sword he liked waving around. Both appeared stoic but he could tell nerves were gnawing at them. Marion, for one, scowled at her hands as she rubbed them repeatedly on her lap. He wouldn’t mind doing it for her.

  Hey. Pull you dick back in your pants. You said no to her. So hands off.

  And Hugo, well, he was scowling as well but it was his usual expression. Unless she’d told him and it gave Conan another reason to be pissed off.

  His situation alternately pressed in on him when he considered the truth behind Thomas’ and Marion’s crazy claim and then lightened as denial surfaced once again. He couldn’t be in eleven forty-eight. It was impossible on so many levels he couldn’t even begin to explain it, not even to himself. But then again, maybe the plane had been struck by lightning and passed through a sort of time rip or something, to crash land somewhere in the Alps, almost one thousand years before it’d taken off.

  Talk about jet lag!

  A.J. found he couldn’t froth himself into anger or despair as he considered life around him. There were worse things than having a woman such as Marion showing him around her world. A.J. shook his head.

  But it won’t happen now ‘cause you said no. You gotta give a guy some time to think about these things. I wish she wouldn’t have sprung this one on me. Dammit.

  There were three hypotheses to explain his situation. No, actually, there could be four thousand, but he was just a lawyer, not a theoretical physicist and so would just deal with the three he could wrap his humble brain around.

  A. He really had gone back in time—no matter the how and why—and would have to live with it. There would be no helicopter or search and rescue mission.

  B. Some medieval fan-cult led by a blonde curvaceous bombshell had found him and was intent on keeping him, which, as much as he thought he was being a moron, didn’t manage to make him that worried. Or…

  C. Reality television was playing with the geek du jour and generating dismal ratings because Alexandre-Jean Bernier might be a reviled lawyer, a handsome guy and—let’s face it—a smart puppy but he wasn’t a puppet who enjoyed having its strings pulled and tended to dig his heels in.

  In the words of Sherlock Holmes or some other smart old fa
rt, when you’ve dismissed the moronic, whatever is left has to be the truth. Or something like that.

  So chances were, hypothesis A was the right one. Or B. Please don’t let it be C. A.J. looked down at himself and cringed. He was wearing a dress. He couldn’t be seen on TV this way.

  “Is everything all right, Sir Ayjay?” Marion asked as she deftly maneuvered her dark brown horse closer. He wished he could drive—er, ride—his horse as she did. It looked so easy to her.

  “I’m just thinking how I’ve probably lost my mind.” He rolled his index finger by his temple.

  “Would it be easier if you believed you had lost your mind?”

  His lawyer brain kicked into high gear. Loaded question. Deflect and obfuscate.

  Was she referring to him turning her down or just the general feeling of all-purpose insanity breathing down his neck? Did she really want to know or was she just asking? Women were like that, they asked a ton of questions, sometimes not even trying to get an answer. A.J. looked at her, spotted the wounded pride but nothing else. He was a big-shot lawyer, dammit. He couldn’t just tell the truth. What would that make him? An inexpensive, idealist law graduate?

  Fuck. It used to be me. Back when I took cases based on merit.

  Marion patiently waited for his answer. Argh, Christ, just go with the truth and damn the torpedoes.

  “Yes, it’d be much easier. I could just pretend you and Thomas are right and that I’ve gone back—”

  He looked at Hugo, who kept staring straight ahead. “Hey, your folks won’t try to burn me at the stake, will they? If they hear my story? ‘Cause I’ll be a Norman then, no problem.”

  Wouldn’t that make for a grand finale on any reality TV show? Live tonight, a witch burning! Tune in and watch the lawyer burrrrn!

  Despite the pain still lingering in her eyes, she laughed and shook her head as if saying, “there, there”.

  He’d never been the kind of desperate soul to need people’s laughter in his life, but right then the lovely sound made him wish he could be witty and amusing just for the pleasure of hearing Marion laugh. Especially after he’d made love to her then turned around and pushed her away.