The Winter Bear's Bride (Dubious Book 2) (9 page)

But he wanted more. Would always want more. She was his own addiction; one he knew he would never be cured of.

If he blocked everything out, he could almost imagine she wasn’t the scheming bitch he knew her to be. Knowing she was sound asleep, he reached out and stroked a lock of her blonde hair from her face. Whatever dye she’d used at the ball had faded, the pale locks like silk against his pillows. It suited her creamy skin better. For a moment, he allowed himself to sink into a long-held fantasy. Coming home to find her all softness and smiles, warmth and honesty in her dark eyes as she greeted him.

His perfect wife. The woman he’d been waiting for all his life.

The fantasy expanded to show them in his rooms, on thick furs in front of a roaring fire. His larger body was curled protectively around hers, his hand stroking over her belly, swollen with his cub. Longing hit him, stealing his breath and snapping him out of his fantasy. Without thinking, he smoothed his hand over the flat smoothness of her stomach. He’d taken her many times last night, so she could already be pregnant. Could already be carrying his cub. She was a bearmate, but he hadn’t bonded her yet…not given her the bite that would ensure any child she carried was an alpha.

He’d taken her virginity, but he hadn’t bonded her. It was a dick move and he knew it. In their society, a woman mated but not bonded was one thing—a whore. If he cast her aside now, no man would marry her. She would be seen as being good for only one thing. His bear snarled, rage pouring through him at the thought of any man but him touching her.

His fist clenched as he fought down the anger. No. She was his. No other man would ever touch her, ever see her spread out on a bed, her golden hair around her and desire in her eyes. She would be his, for always, even though she was a lying bitch.

But he would never give her his heart. Never allow her that sort of power over him.

She murmured in her sleep and turned, as though seeking him, curling up against the warmth of his body like an animal seeking shelter. His bear rumbled within, the need to protect her dragged unwillingly from his soul. Somehow, although no one else could, despite the fact she’d lied to him, she drew out the need to look after her.

Sighing, he lifted his hand and raked his loose hair back from his face. He needed to sort out what she’d done, though, and quickly, before he lost face. He couldn’t afford it to be known that he had been outwitted by a female, much less Magnus Asmundr’s daughter. That was worse than being bested by the man himself. A fact that Magnus would not hesitate to capitalize on if he survived.

Sliding from the bed, he tucked the blankets around Analise to keep her warm and strode across the room. After dragging his leathers on and buckling his belt, he was pulling his boots on when a sound from the bed made him look up.

“My lord?”

Analise sat up in the bed, furs held across her chest, and her hair a riotous tumble of curls around her creamy shoulders. The memory of how her skin tasted, the sexy little sound she made when he touched her, hit him, and he almost groaned with the need to stride back across the room and get back into the bed with her.

As soon as he thought it, he was suiting thoughts to actions. Yanking his boots from his feet, he stalked across the room. Her breathing caught at his approach, eyes wide as she scuttled back in the bed, but he wasn’t having any of that. Reaching out, he grabbed her trailing ankle and yanked her toward him.

“My lord!” she gasped, tumbled to her back, her hair a tangled mess around her on the sheets. “Please…what are you doing?”

With hard hands, he pulled the furs from her, leaving her naked to his gaze. Her slender body tensed, then relaxed as he ran his hand down her curves. She was so responsive, melting as soon as he touched her, that he could almost believe her soft gasps and moans meant she felt something for him more than as a means to an end.

“After last night, I would have thought that would be obvious,” he said, pulling her under him. He dealt with the fastenings on his pants and within a heartbeat he had his cock in his hand. It throbbed savagely as he dipped his hips and rubbed the broad head against her pussy. Stroked it against her clit.

“Again?” The sudden darkness of her eyes almost tipped him over the edge there and then. Within a couple of strokes, her hips rocked against him, seeking more sensation. Liquid heat bathed the head of his cock, her body signaling its readiness for his possession.

“You’re mine, remember?” he growled, not wanting conversation or softness. He wanted to fuck her, hard and fast, and rid himself of this hold she had over him. Altering his position, he fit himself at the entrance to her pussy and pushed.

She gasped, back arching up as he sheathed himself in one hard movement. For a second, he froze, worried he’d hurt her, but the soft groan that escaped her throat said otherwise. Relief rolled through him, quickly replaced by desire as his dick reminded him that he was balls-deep in her silken softness.

Pulling back, he thrust again. And moaned. The sensation was divine. Heavenly. He didn’t have words to describe the feeling of her body tightly gloved around his, nor did he care to. Hooking hard fingers behind her knees, he drew her legs up and hooked them over his arms, pressed forward so she was completely open to him.

“My lord…Scar!” she cried his name as the change in position took him deeper. Her moans spilled from her throat into the silence of the room as he claimed her ruthlessly. Pounded into her to forget the fledging feelings trying to break through the wall around his heart.

It didn’t take long. A hard knot of pleasure built in the small of his back, then wrapped around to grip his balls and cock in a fiery-hot embrace. He gasped, then drove into her a last time as he came, hard and fast. His cock pulsed, filling her with his white-hot seed. Her pussy clamped down around him, tight grip milking him as her own release overtook her slender body.

He waited until the pulses stopped and pulled from her. She moaned in disappointment, her body still twitching as she turned onto her side, away from him. The fact she wouldn’t meet his eyes sliced through him, but he ignored it. Taking a step back, he buttoned himself up.

“Be ready for me when I get back,” he ordered and stalked out of the room before he could change his mind and pull her into his arms to comfort her.

****

They called her his whore.

Always behind her back, of course, but Analise wasn’t deaf. She heard the whispers as she walked through the keep, trying to find something to do. Everyone she met eyed her with suspicion, polite to her face, but as soon as she turned around, she felt their eyes on her. Their dislike was palpable.

It didn’t help that the only dress she had was the one she’d arrived in. Now mended, it was thin and simple in design, baring her neck and shoulders, the skin there unmarked. Proving to all and sundry that Scar hadn’t found her appealing enough to bond her to him.

Conscious of the lack, she pulled her hair down from its knot and fluffed it out over her shoulders. She was married now, so she could wear it how she liked, and the loose style went a little way toward covering her shame.

Her face carefully expressionless, she found herself in the ladies chamber above the main hall. With a balcony that looked over the hall and a huge picture window with a view over the snow-covered landscape, it was pretty and, to her relief, empty. Her steps silent over the polished floor, she headed to the window and looked out.

With the sun blazing down, the snow looked so pretty, but she knew it was a deceptive beauty. The weather could turn in an instant and become lethal…not that it mattered to her. She had nowhere to go, even if she could get out of the keep. Scar and the main force of his men were gone, but there were enough warriors left to guard both heavily fortified gates. Although, she was fairly certain they were there less to guard from outsiders than to ensure she didn’t try and leave.

She sighed and turned, looking around the room. Everything was neat and clean, the keep obviously well organized and maintained. Not used to having nothing to do, she’d tried to help the servants earlier. None of them wanted her help…not even the lowliest scullery maid. They’d all been polite, but she’d seen the suspicion and dislike behind their eyes and “my lady’s”. So she was at a loss. It was strange going from running a keep to merely sitting around like noblewomen were supposed to do.

Her gaze fell on a pile of linens. Checking the coast was clear, she drifted closer and picked one up.
Scar’s shirts.
They had to be. Carefully, she unfolded one to find a large slash across the back. Her gut clenched at the sight of it. Someone had gotten close enough to attack him with a blade or claws, and had penetrated deep enough to go through his armor to the shirt beneath. Fear for him hit her, and she covered her mouth with one hand, schooling her reaction. He could have been killed.

Quickly, she rifled through the pile. It was the only one with that kind of damage. The rest were all worn cuffs or hems that had frayed. Spotting a mending basket half hidden under a nearby chair, she recovered it and took her haul over to the deep window seat. Settling herself in, she distracted herself by mending, her fingers setting delicate stitches as she tried not to let her mind wander.

Hours later, she had a pile of mended shirts and her equilibrium, if not level, was at least a little less ragged. The horns announcing the return of the warriors sounded just as she set the last stitches, snipping the thread with her teeth, and she folded the last shirt to put it on top of the pile. Packing everything away where she’d found it, she made her way to the balcony, pausing on the top step as Scar swept into the hall below.

Her heart stuttered at the sight of him. He always took her breath away. Tall and handsome, with his dark hair flowing over his shoulders, he oozed virility and danger. His lean-hipped walk hinted at stamina, stamina she could attest to after last night and this morning. Just remembering his touch made her body tingle and her blood race.

And he was her husband…

Her gaze moved downward and she registered that his leather armor was covered in blood. Ice trickled down her spine. She sped down the remaining steps and across the hall to stand in front of him.

“My lord…are you okay? Were you attacked?”

Worried, she tried to check him for wounds, but he captured her hands in his.

“No, I wasn’t attacked.”

Confused, she stopped, looking up at him. His face was as hard as granite, the expression like ice.

“If you weren’t attacked…”

Her words trailed off as she looked around at the warriors as they trooped into the hall behind their lord. They didn’t have the bearing of warriors who had been defeated, but more like warriors returning home triumphant. Her gaze cut back to Scar, her voice a pale imitation of what it had been.

“But…the truce? You promised.” Try as she might, she couldn’t keep the note of accusation out of her voice. He had promised. He’d signed the agreement at the same time as she had. His expression didn’t falter. If anything, it became more set, his dark eyes flashing with anger.

“I did. I promised the Lady of Asmundr a truce in exchange for her hand in marriage.”

The hall around them fell silent as all ears turned their way. Normally, she’d have avoided such a scene, but right now she was so stunned, she didn’t care.

“I don’t understand?” Surely, there was some mistake. Perhaps she was dreaming. Yes, that was it, she decided. She was still asleep and this was a nightmare.

“You got what you wanted. I—we are married.”
Even if you don’t find me woman enough to bear your mark,
she added silently.

“Not quite.” He stepped closer, looking down at her with such a cold look that she died a little inside. “I made a deal with the Lady of Asmundr, but when you came to me, you were no longer that person. You were
capta sperata…
clanless, weren’t you, Analise?”

Oh. Shit.

Her jaw dropped and she simply looked at him. He was right, she had been, but she hadn’t realized what she’d thought to be her masterstroke could be turned around so easily. She flicked a glance down at the blood covering his leathers and felt sick. It had all been for nothing.

She’d married the devil himself and she was going to rot in living hell.

Any idiot could see Analise wasn’t happy, and Scar was far
from an idiot
.

Slouched in his throne-like chair at the head of the hall, he watched his beautiful wife as she served wine to his men, one of the many menial duties he’d assigned to her. In the weeks since their marriage, she’d shared his bed every night, and he hadn’t hesitated to avail himself of her body. But as freely as she gave herself physically, mentally and emotionally she was closed off from him. It seemed the only time he saw the woman she had been before was in the throes of passion when she came apart in his arms.

Growling, he knocked back the wine in his goblet. His eyes didn’t leave her as she made her way around the table. She’d lost weight, the sumptuous gowns he’d had made for her already slender figure hanging from her.
Disgusting,
he told himself. What man would want a woman who looked like a stiff breeze would snap her in two? But his bravado masked the concern he wouldn’t allow himself to feel. He’d done that to her.

Anger was a far easier emotion to deal with, and he let it have free rein to simmer as he watched her. Did she pause at the end, lingering as she filled one of the younger warrior’s goblets with a smile. Jaxon, the youth in question, smiled broadly, reaching out to take it, his fingers brushing hers…

Scar snarled, on his feet in an instant and storming toward them. Grabbing his wife by the shoulder, he knocked the jug out of her hands to shatter on the floor.

“Fucking one of my warriors will get you nothing but your lover killed, my lady,” he stated, hand hard in her hair as he turned his glare onto Jaxon. Jealousy raged, obliterating rational thought. She was
his.
How dare she smile at another man when she would barely look at him?