Linda Barlow (64 page)

"The sun was in my eyes." She managed the smile after all.

He did not smile back. He wasn't seeing her; he was seeing himself, a grief-stricken boy leaping from the dark family pew in a sweet-smelling, ornately decorated chapel...rushing past the coffin that bore the last earthly remains of his beloved mother...standing up in front of an entire village of shocked retainers to accuse his own father of murder. His father, whom he had looked up to and imitated. His father, who, inexplicably, had turned against him, tormented him, beaten him. He had never understood why, how he had offended, what he had done wrong. He had turned to his mother for comfort, his beautiful, laughing mother, who was dead.

Christ! Screaming in rage, rending his clothes in grief... then burying those feelings for years. Burying them deep. Fleeing from Whitcombe and the father he hated, and finding another man to look up to. Another man to imitate. And, very slowly, very tentatively, another man to love.

And now, after years of trust, another betrayal.

His father was not a murderer, after all. But Francis Lacklin was.

"Roger?" Alexandra had pushed herself up to a sitting position, cursing her own jumpiness and wondering what had brought that tortured look to Roger's face. Had Merwynna told him about Francis? She glanced at the wisewoman, whose expression gave no help, no hints. "Is aught amiss?"

Roger's sensual lower lip curled with irony.
Is aught amiss?
Nothing much. Nothing but the world blasted to smithereens. Nothing but every truth there is destroyed. Except one. Alix. He focused on her green eyes, her sweet, worried face. Her bright hair. Alix. His candle in the dark.

"Are you feeling better?" he asked.

"Oh, yes. Much better."

He snatched up her clothes from in front of the hearth and thrust them at her. "Dress yourself, then. I have a horse outside. We're going back to Whitcombe."

"But surely—"

"Now."

And so within a very few minutes she was sitting astride a big gray gelding dressed in her old gown and wrapped up warmly in a blanket. Her bare feet were hanging down on either side—they had not been able to recover her shoes from the lake—and Roger's chest was jammed against her back, his thighs feeling hard and lithely masculine on either side of her own, his breath fanning the tendrils of hair on the back of her neck. The early morning sun cast a subtle rosy light through the stark trees. Unlike yesterday, the new day was fair. And there was sultriness in the air that promised unseasonable warmth.

They did not speak. Alexandra waited in vain for questions that did not come. She sensed powerful passions burning inside him; she felt them in the rigidity of his body. This, she remembered, was the man she had fled from, the man who had stalked her for two months and several hundred miles, abandoning his ships, his men, and his planned voyage to the Middle Sea to pursue her into the country where he was now considered an outlaw. He had been gentle and forbearing with her last night, yes, but the arm that encircled her waist was not particularly gentle now. He held her possessively, implacably, as if to warn her she would not escape from him again.

Not that she wished to escape. In fact, as she cast her eyes down and saw the tan flesh of his forearm around her, the strong sinews, the well-shaped bones of his wrist, Alexandra felt a quicksilver flash of excitement. She remembered the deft and tender movements of those hands upon her flesh; hands that had not touched her in far too long.

Sensing her thought, Roger altered the position of his hand slightly, enough to allow his fingers to slip inside the opening of her blanket and brush across her breasts. An earthquake of desire rumbled inside her. She leaned more completely against him, seeking the pleasures his body could provide. His hand came up, covering one of her breasts, kneading it, then moving to take the other. As his thumb flicked over her nipple, a sigh escaped her.

His horse slowed and stopped under the thick branches of an oak. Both Roger's hands were on her breasts now, and his lips were nuzzling the back of her neck. He threaded kisses up under her hair and around the side of her jaw. His teeth took her earlobe, bore down, pulled slightly. His tongue darted inside the shell of her ear.

Alexandra made a sound deep in the back of her throat. Desire, yearning. Roger echoed her with a groan. Quickly he dismounted and held out his arms for her. They were deep in the ancient oak grove where she had once relaxed and laughed with Roger and Francis Lacklin. The huge trees were thick around them, mysterious, silent, and wise. They offered shelter; impassive, they judged not, they knew no sin.

"Come to me, beloved."

She stared at him, his dark hair, his eyes burning with silken command. His body, tall and lean and beautiful. His hands, which reached for her. His fingers were long and autocratic, beautiful. She remembered the sensual magic they could weave.

She brought her leg over the horse's neck with little of the grace she'd struggled so hard at court to acquire. He didn't seem to mind her clumsiness. He was smiling as she slid into his arms.

Roger carried her into the shade of a giant oak and set her down. With gentle hands, he unwrapped the blanket from her body and spread it upon the ground. Then he swiftly unfastened her gown. His fingers had begun to shake, and he couldn't stop kissing her—her eyes, her mouth, her fingers, her throat, and every inch of bare flesh he revealed as he stripped the fabric from her. He jerked the bodice down to her waist and pulled her close, rubbing her breasts against his chest. His eyes were glazed, his breath impossibly fast.

"Christ, love, I'm out of my head with wanting you. Two months of celibacy is enough to drive me to the edge of madness."

"You've taken no other women to warm your bed?"

"God, no. The thought sickens me. It's you I want, only you." He grinned. "Curious, isn't it? I've never felt this way before."

"I've always felt this way. You're the only man I've
ever
wanted."

His hands tightened in her hair. "After you left me, I imagined you with Alan... you've always loved him—"

"As a brother."

"—and he has a passion for you. Oh, I trusted you. I trusted you, but sometimes, even so, my mind conjured up images that made me wild with jealousy and rage. Wild," he repeated, dropping his head to take her mouth. He kissed her deep and hard, taking fierce possession. "God's blood, how I want you. I could die of it."

"I know. I feel the same." And she did. She wasn't sure if it was the two months of celibacy, or the need for an affirmation of life in the face of death, but she was drunk with desire. Her wits were fuzzy and there was a conflagration throughout her body, centered deep and radiating outward. His kisses burned her, set her aflame.

He pressed her down on the blanket, careful not to hurt her, yet possessed of a ferocious passion that could barely be controlled. In a few rapid, economical movements, he finished stripping her, and then attended to his own clothing. While he tore at his points and hose, her fingers brushed over him, teasing the tense sinews bunched beneath his smooth skin, luxuriating in his strength, his ardor, his slightly threatening masculinity. And then he was naked, his body as lithe and beautiful in her eyes as a pagan god's. Her eyes admired his strong yet slender frame—the wide, angular shoulders, the expanse of golden-tan flesh on his chest, lightly dusted with wiry black curls, the trim waist and taut hips, the tight buttocks, and long, graceful legs. And most glorious of all, his cock, full and swollen and yearning for its haven inside her body.

Grinning, Roger dropped to his knees beside her. "Wide-eyed, are you, lassie?" He pressed kisses all over her face and neck. "One would think you'd never seen it before."

Her brows arched mischievously. "The light in our cabin on the
Argo
was poor."

"True, more's the pity." He guided her hand to him. "Touch me, love, the way I taught you. Aye, that's it." He threw his head back, the tendons in his neck full prominent. After a moment he cursed softly and pushed her hand away. "On second thought, you'd better stop before I disgrace myself, leaving you unfilled, unsatisfied. Give me a moment." He lay down beside her, fighting for control. She curled against him, her fingers dancing over his naked flesh, her lips finding the sweet hollow at the base of his throat and kissing him tenderly.

At length Roger pushed himself up on one elbow and slid one hand between their bodies. He caressed her, taking his time now. Although he could hardly wait to sheathe himself inside her soft, hot flesh, he wanted it to be good for her. Perfect. "Your breasts are bigger, heavier. I can feel the difference, my love."

"Aye, and soon my entire body will be large and ungainly. Will you still want me then?"

"Oh, yes. I'll always want you. I'll always love you. But for own your sake 'tis a jolly good thing you're with child and in need of tenderness. For I was of a mind to thrash you when I caught you, little rabbit." His hand came up and gripped her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes. "You ought to have trusted me. I was drunk that last evening when we talked. Were it not for that, I wouldn't have been so callous. I have no great liking for my father, but blood is blood. I wouldn't have sat back and allowed Sir Charles to carry out his threat."

"You mean you'd have given in? Sent me home yourself?"

"I'd have done something. Married you, for a start. Offered to meet your father somewhere neutral, so I could have proved to him that what he saw that terrible night when I carried you off was a temporary madness, a mistake, an aberration. I can't blame the man for fearing for your life, given the way I acted."

"I tried to explain to him. He still doesn't believe me, you know. He seems to think you've cast a spell over me."

"Somehow I will have to convince him that I am not the rogue I'm painted to be." He frowned at her. "I sometimes think I still have to convince you of that."

"What do you mean?"

"Simply that I'm weary of people thinking me such a monster. Plotting to murder the queen, fratricide, patricide, rape—my colorful reputation bears little resemblance to the actual facts."

She turned her face away, heart-stricken by his words. "Forgive me, Roger."

His lips brushed her cheek; his teeth found an earlobe and nipped. "Not until you beg."

She sinuously arched against him, bringing their intimate parts in close conjunction, writhing and seeking him in a way she knew he would not be able to resist. "Like this?"

He groaned; his body tensed in feigned reluctance. "You've remembered all that I taught you, I see."

"'Tis hardly something one forgets!"

For one more second he held back. "The babe, Alix? Will we hurt the baby?"

"No, no," she assured him.

"'Twill not cause you to miscarry?"

She laughed gently. "If loving could bring on miscarriage, there would be very few children born into this world."

The words were scarcely out of her mouth when his hands were on her, caressing her breasts, her belly, her thighs. Gently he parted the soft folds of her sex, murmuring love words and erotic promises. Deliciously he stroked and courted her until his fingers were bathed in her moisture. Then, shifting quickly, he brought back his hips and thrust, filling her deeply, and again, more deeply still.

"Oh, my love. 'Tis very,
very
good!"

He raised his head, not answering. For several seconds he did not move; he simply held her pinned to the ground by the force of his loins while he stared deep into her eyes with an indescribable expression in his brown eyes—fierce, possessive, and angry, cruel and tender, loving and demanding—all emotions rolled into one.

The pressure inside her was intolerable. She moved fretfully against him, but he was inexorable. He kept her still, impaled upon his bone-hard flesh, his dark eyes all glittery and savage. Then, slowly, so slowly she thought she would scream, he began to move, watching her eyes, her face, her breathing with all the instincts of a predator. For a moment she thought that this was her punishment for leaving him. To be controlled, dominated by his sheer physical power. To be tortured slowly until she pleaded for release. To be held at the very threshold of ecstasy but denied the relief of falling through that golden doorway. His revenge. He was capable of such, she knew.

But then he lowered his head and kissed her sweetly, and she knew she'd been mistaken. Something was driving him, yes, but it was not directed against her. Something was hurting him, numbing his mind. And she was his only sanctuary.

Forgetting her own fears, desires, and needs, she held him tightly and told him of a love that was unchanging and eternal, enduring until death, and beyond. And in selflessness, she found a release more intense than any she had known before. Without striving, her body found its pleasure, just moments before he also stiffened and cried out. Together they seemed to glide above the earth, soulbound and united in a manner that defied the physical limitations of their senses.

 
When it was over, he did not withdraw, but remained clasped in her arms, his skin slick, his heart hammering, and his breathing convulsive. As he continued to shudder against her, she finally understood that he was weeping. Roger Trevor, strong and confident leader of men, was quietly sobbing in her arms.

Alexandra stiffened, shocked beyond words. Then, abruptly, she recalled the expression on his face this morning when she'd awakened. He knew, she realized. She did not have to tell him;
he knew.