by Kris Kennedy
A blade of shock sliced through her. She gasped and he slid his tongue inside.
He stroked her, slippery and caressing, deepening the incursion as he went, his mouth slanting more forcefully, his tongue sinking in deeper.
A shower of heat sparked through her body. She opened her mouth wider and let him move in deeper, asking more of her with each lash of his tongue.
She responded. Her tongue slid out, touched his, then slipped inside his mouth.
He made a low sound, not a word, not a growl, but something in between. Still holding her with the hand curled at the nape of her neck, he shoved the table out of the way with his other hand, scattering the little wooden figurines as he pulled her body up against his.
He never stopped the kiss.
Her arms slid up his chest to his neck, and wrapped around his shoulders, hanging on.
She inhaled his musky, masculine scent, as he cupped her face with one hand, the other hanging low at his side. Then he skimmed that hand up her hip. Her head tipped back on a gasp of pleasure.
“Máel,” she whispered.
His hand tightened, guiding her closer until their bodies touched from belly to chest. The hard thrust of his arousal pushed against her stomach.
Wild heat pulsed inside her. She went up on her toes and met every demanding thrust of his tongue with one of her own, until their tongues were tangled, their mouths locked.
This kiss would last forever, and she wanted nothing more.
Then the moment broke.
A loud noise came from outside, and “care” came swooping back into her life like a carrion bird.
Chapter 13
Cassia jerked away from him, backing up, clutching the front of her gown.
He stood beside the overturned table, chess pieces scattered underfoot, his eyes tracking her, darkened by passion.
“I….” She swallowed and tried again. “We should not have… I didn’t know you meant to—”
“Aye, you did.”
She squeezed the fabric, pleating it into irreversible wrinkles. “You are a devil.” She bit the words off. “You have no honor—”
“You already knew that, Cassia. And you wanted it anyhow.”
She choked.
“You are a woman. I am a man. You beg for fire, you will get burned.”
“I do not beg.” She spat the word.
He smiled coldly. “Yet.”
Fueled by the roiling, volcanic chasm of emotional intensity inside her, she stepped forward and slapped him.
In the next second, she knew what a terrible mistake she had made.
Terror washed through her, as violent as the desire had been. She tried to stumble away but he took both her hands and drew her closer, until she was as close as she'd been when he was dragging passion out of her body.
He would ravish her. Attack her. Punish her. Teach her the folly of toying with Irishmen from enchanted forests.
He bent his head and whispered, “Do not move.”
She froze.
He wasn’t looking at her. His gaze was aimed over her head, at the walls of the tent. He was listening.
She listened too, confused.
Distant sounds of the camp drifted in: people talking; the neigh of a horse; someone’s campfire crackling, but nothing urgent—
A small boy’s head popped through the tent. Máel whipped around.
“They’re coming,” the boy hissed.
Máel bent and snatched up a few of his packs then ran for the tent flap, pulling her after him. He shoved her through it and followed close on her heels.
Gasping with this new shock—and there had been so many on this day; surely the adventure must end soon—she tried to slow the moment down.
“What is happening?” she demanded.
“We must go. Now.”
He snatched the reins of his snorting horse, who trotted quite obediently after, and their small group hurtled out into the darkness.
Terrified and confused, Cassia followed him as he urged her onward. They ran silently, past the nearby tents, out into the greater darkness. He kept her moving for a hundred yards or more, up a long hillside, to the eaves of the great forest encircling Rose Citadel. When they were under the cover of trees, he finally drew to a halt.
She bent over, panting. “What in God’s name are you doing?”
“Your father has returned.”
She looked up in confused, angry astonishment. “You are full mad. Is that not what you wanted?”
“I don’t think he’s bringing what I want.” He stood, staring back into the camp.
She straightened. “Why else would he come back if not to—”
Her words dropped off as, back in the camp, the Irishman's tent went up in flames.
She flung her hand over her mouth.
Máel swung to her. “What do you know of this?”
“Nothing,” she whispered, stunned.
His blue eyes were hot with fury. “Your father just tried to burn me alive. And you too. What do you know?”
Her body gave a single hard jerk, as if she were a plum tree being shaken to drop the ripest fruit. “You cannot be suggesting my father did this? That is a lie. My father would never endanger me—”
He flung his hands down as if she burned and spun to stare into the camp.
Máel watched four shadowy men stalk around the tent, but a great hue and cry went up, and they backed away.
Soon everyone from the camp was running toward the burning tent. Buckets arrived from the river, dousing the flames.
When it was out, people stood in small clusters, waving their arms and shouting, demanding to know what had happened and who had done this.
No one answered.
The shadowy men lurked around the perimeter of the angry circle. In the darkness, their livery and crests could not be seen, but Máel did not need to see to know: it was d’Argent and his men.
Had he not been beaten half to death by them once before?
As he watched, they turned and crept off, then climbed onto horses and rode away.
Máel took a step after them, vibrating with the urge to hunt them down and slit their throats. To find d'Argent and slay him in the vilest ways imaginable.
Right now, the choice was simple.
Go after them or not?
Alone?
Not a chance.
With Cassia?
Never.
Fáelán and Rowan had not yet arrived. There was no way to know when—or if—they would.
That left one option.
He uttered a foul curse and tugged on Fury's reins, bringing the horse around. He turned to Cassia.
“Get on,” he ordered.
She took a step back. “You cannot take me anywhere.”
“Aye, I can.”
“I-I am your hostage,” she said, and to be truthful, the stammer in her voice was satisfying to hear. But then she announced proudly, if shakily, “I must be treated as such. You are bound by the rules of convention.”
“I am bound by nothing,” he growled. “Get on the horse.”
Her face went white.
Odin appeared out of the darkness, bouncing in excitement. “You got away,” he crowed happily.
“Not yet,” Máel muttered. “Get on,” he said again to Cassia.
Odin looked at the dark shapes of Cassia and Fury, then peered up at Máel. “You escaping?”
“Go.”
His face collapsed. “Take me with—“
Máel dropped an entire pouch of coins into the boy’s hand. It was an outrageous amount of money. Odin and whatever warren of children he huddled with at night would be fed for the rest of their lives. Or he’d be robbed by dawn.
None of it mattered to Máel. None of it could matter.
He had one thing left of his father, one thing left of home. He would not let English take it away.
Odin stared at the pile of pennies then looked up swiftly. “I can help—”
“I cann
ot be helped. Go. Now.”
Odin tossed him one bleak look of betrayal and ran off.
Máel spun to Cassia.
She was gone.
His blood slowed to a sluggish, preparatory beat.
He turned another inch and saw her, backing up into the shadow of the trees.
Chapter 14
Cassia locked gazes with him as she backed up slowly.
Too many things had happened. Too much had been overturned. Her heart hammered, her breath came swift and shallow, her head whirled.
She didn’t know anything but that she had to get away from this bandit. Get back to her father. There was no way—no way on Earth—that he had burned down the Irishman’s tent thinking her still inside. Surely he had searched first.
Surely.
“Where are you taking me?” she stammered.
“Into the wild.”
“I cannot go into the wild,” she whispered. “I am noble-born. I am not made for wild things.”
“You will learn.” Anger rolled off him in waves.
There was no hope there.
She backed up another step and bumped into a tree. A frantic look over her shoulder revealed nothing but deep forest on all sides, black-green and thick. Spears of moonlight rayed down here and there, breaking the blackness, revealing downed trees and thick vines and dense underbrush in a silvery, ghostly glow.
One thought sped through the valley of her fear-stricken mind: His horse will never get through that.
As if following the direction of her thoughts, he flicked his gaze over her shoulder, then snapped it back.
“Do not,” he warned in a low voice.
“Why not?” she whispered, stalling for time as she tried to discern what was directly behind her. A log she would have to leap over, or vines she could smash through?
“Because it would be reckless and foolish,” he said softly.
“Perhaps that is what is called for in this situation.” Log. It was a log behind her.
“You would never get away, Cassia.”
“I might.”
“I would catch you.”
“Then I would be in much the same position I am now.” And behind the log, a suspiciously bright green patch.
Bog. Avoid.
“Not precisely. Because then I would be angry.”
She nodded shakily. He had a point. “Of course, you would have to catch me first.”
“Och, lass, I would catch you,” he said, sounding almost regretful.
Her fingers bit into the gnarled tree bark behind her.
He took a step closer. “What other choice do you have?”
His words rung in her head.
She was weary of having no choices.
She broke and ran.
Panting wildly, darting back and forth, she banged low-lying limbs out of her way with an upraised arm as she ducked beneath them and leapt over downed trees. She could hear nothing but the sound of her own erratic, frantic breathing.
Then, low and distant, came the sound of a set of boots, following behind.
Her heart climbed in her throat. She ran faster, chanting every prayer to every saint of lost causes she could recall. There were a great many of them, and one never knew who was listening this night.
She heard him pursing her, tracking her, which would not be difficult. There were only so many women fleeing through the woods tonight, tearing apart low clouds of mists, shredding them, leaving a trail of broken specters in her wake.
She met a creek and splashed through the middle of it, wetting her skirts to the knees, then clambered up the far, muddy side, and stumbled to a halt. Leaning over, she put her hands on her thighs, panting.
After a moment, she straightened and held her breath, listening.
No sound of pursuit.
She took off running again, cutting sharply to follow the waterway. Flowing water would eventually lead her back to Rose Citadel, or at least to houses and people.
Proof of her theory came when she stumbled onto a dim, barely discernible path, a silvery-brown track in the trickling-down moonlight.
She ran all-out now, her heart and legs pumping, hair flying. Even if she’d wanted to listen for pursuit she couldn’t have; her labored breath was all she heard. She could hardly see, either; her hair was flying all about.
She turned once to look over her shoulder, a wild glance that revealed nothing but the moon-washed thread of a tiny track, unraveling behind her.
She faced forward again, giving her a split second to see the Irishman had somehow got in front of her, and was standing in the middle of the path.
She hurtled directly into him, straight into his armored body and toppled them both over, him backward, her on top.
For a second she was enshrouded in the hard, dark power of him, his cape whirling around them like bat wings, their breathing hard and hot and labored, mingling together.
“Stop,” he rasped.
Stopping did not seem wise.
With a burst, she flung herself away and slithered out of his grasp. He gave a muted curse as she rolled a few painful times over tree roots and sticks and something soft and furry and no doubt dead, then she was up again, running.
He caught her in three strides.
She struck out in a frenzy and they both went rolling, until this time he came to rest atop her. Everything went immediately, abruptly, shockingly still.
He loomed over her. Dark hair fell forward beside his mouth, which had compressed into a single, thin line. His eyes were terrifying: blue and furious. His body ranged the length of hers, packed with muscle and anger, his knees on either side of hers, one palm planted on the earth beside her head.
The other, oddly, was cradling the back of her head, keeping it off the ground.
His gaze held her like a steel cord. She was bound to his cold, glittering eyes and she knew she was doomed.
Not because she did not scream for help, for there was none.
Not because she had not cried, “I yield,” for she never would.
Not because she didn’t raise her knee and smash it up between his legs, for she was trapped and could not move.
But because, in these straits, when all had failed, when there was nothing she could rely on and she faced certain doom, her heart dragged a single word from the depths of her soul: the name of the man who had engineered that doom.
“Máel,” she whispered.
Then a beat more.
“Please.”
For a second he held, then he muttered something in Irish and rolled off her.
Perhaps she could rely on something after all.
Chapter 15
“Dia ár sábháil.” Máel muttered the foul curse and pushed off her, rolling to a sitting position, his knees bent, staying directly beside her, ready to grab her at the first sign of escape.
But she was breathing too heavily and lay on her back, in the leaves, panting.
He looked down at her prone form. “I told you I would catch you.”
“Yes, well, my gown…” She paused to pant. “Tripped me up… Repeatedly.”
He felt torn between poles of intense emotions—fury, despair, the urge to laugh. He stomped on them, burying them where they belonged, in the gutter of his heart.
His original plan had been simple: leave the tent when darkness fell, situate himself up high, and wait. For he’d known d’Argent would try something perfidious: the man simply knew no other way.
But Cassia had drunk his whiskey and shown her spirit and competed with him as no one ever had, and he became distracted. Forgot to attend the ever-present danger of his life. Forgot to plot. Forgot to hate.
In truth, he’d known nothing but her. The battle in her eyes and the hot surrender of her body, pressing up against him, silken and sweet and willing.
He’d underestimated her. Twice.
For after her father burned down the tent, she ought to have been stunned. Shocked. Frozen with fear.
Docile.
He felt both respect and admiration in equal and sufficient measure to rattle the cold armor around his heart.
It had been an aberration, an error. A weakness. He would not repeat it. No matter how she surprised him. Aroused him. Impressed him.
Muttering another curse, he looked down. She was still flat on her back, recovering her breath.
At the sound of his curse, she rolled her head toward him, crunching the pine needles under her head, releasing their sharp, spicy fresh scent.
“What is happening?” she asked softly. “What is this all about? What did my father take from you?”
He looked into the trees. “My sword.”
She gave a broken, amazed laugh. “A sword? All this over a sword? Dear God, why did you not simply fight in the mêlée and win a sword? Come, we shall return at once. I will pay your entry fee myself. You can—”
“It is my father’s sword.”
The vehemence of his reply silenced her.
He stared down at his open palms, scratched and calloused from years of wielding weapons. Years of never touching women who wore silk. He closed and opened them, feeling the absence of the sword. The absence of hope.
For if he lost his father’s sword, he could never go home.
It was part of the oath.
“It is Moralltach,” he said to his cut and broken hands. “Sword of Fury. A claíomh mór, over three feet long, with a black pearl in the hilt. It was my father’s sword, and my father’s father’s, back unto Aengus, and it does not belong in the hands of a nGall.”
Her panting stopped abruptly. She opened her eyes, then pushed up on her elbows. “A…what?”
“Foreigner.”
“No.” She shook her head impatiently. “Did you say a black pearl?”
He looked up. “Aye.”
A waterfall of blonde hair fell around her face and shoulders. Her cheeks were flushed with color and she was still faintly panting. The movement lifted and lowered her breasts, which he knew from experience were full and heavy. Strands of hair were pasted across her neck and throat as she swallowed, but her eyes never left his.
Spirit, she was, a ban sidhe, from the top of her tousled head to the bottom of her silk-slippered feet and the bright brown eyes staring into his.