Untamed (36 page)

Amalie felt Morgan’s body jerk and looked up to find his eyes closed and his jaw clenched. She yanked her hand away. “I—I hurt you.”

He opened his eyes, chuckled. “Nay,
a leannan
. Quite the contrary.”

Reassured she hadn’t done anything wrong, she let herself explore the strangeness of his stones, cupping their weight in her hand, kneading what truly felt like stones inside—before returning to touch his sex. She closed her fingers around him, stroked the silken length. “You feel so hard and smooth at the same time. This is what goes…inside me?”

“Aye.” His voice was a hoarse whisper, his eyes drifting shut. “Och, lass!”

Slowly she stroked him from root to engorged tip, watched his brow furrow, the muscles of his belly drawing tight. It pleased her to know she could affect him so, this big powerful man suddenly weak in her hands. She tightened her grip and felt a thrill when his head fell back on a groan.

And then before she knew what had happened, she was lifted off her feet, crushed in his embrace, his lips pressed hard against hers, the fingers of one big hand clenched in her hair, the other squeezing her bottom. He kissed her long and hard, ravishing her mouth with lips and teeth and tongue, stealing her breath. The soap-slick heat of his chest scorched her breasts, his chest hair tickling her nipples. Then, breathing hard, he ended the kiss, letting her slide down his slippery, hard body.

He reached to the side and took up the soap, one arm still around her. “And now,
wife,
I shall bathe you.”

He turned her to face away from him, his fingers deftly working soap into her scalp in slow circles, lingering at her temples, behind her ears, at her nape. “Does that feel good?”

“Yes.”
Goose bumps shivered over her skin, the feel of his fingers in her hair more sensual that she would ever have imagined.

“Duck under.”

Amalie took a deep breath and sank below the surface to rinse her hair.

When she came up again, she found his hands had not been idle. Slick with soap, they skimmed over her shoulders, down her arms, then moved over her belly and rib cage with agonizing slowness, her breasts growing heavy in anticipation of his touch.

She did not have to wait long, slippery palms cupping her, his thumbs flicking the already tight buds of her nipples, sending shards of heat to her belly, liquid fire pooling between her thighs. She sank backward into him, rested her head against his chest, instinctively arching to offer him more of herself. “Oh, Morgan!”

He made a sound like a moan and gave her what she wanted, his fingers teasing and tugging at her nipples, his lips and teeth kissing and nipping the sensitive skin beneath her ear, his sex pressing insistently against her lower back—a burning reminder of what was still to come. It felt so good, her body weak and shaking with the pleasure of it, the heat between her thighs now a demanding ache. She writhed in his arms, unable to hold still, her legs parting in a silent plea, the sound of a woman’s desperate whimpers—
her
whimpers—mingling with the melody of the waterfall.

Then his right hand slid down her rib cage, over her belly, to touch her where she needed him most, his fingers parting her, stroking circles over her until she ached not only with arousal but with emptiness, longing to be filled. “Morgan! Help me, please!”

He nibbled her earlobe, sucked it, his voice gruff. “What do you need, lass? Tell me.”

“
You
…I need you…
inside
.”

Never had Morgan been so close to losing control, her innocent sensuality shaking him apart, her whimpered plea leaving his restraint in tatters. He pressed his face against her wet hair, inhaled her sweet, fresh scent, and bit back a groan as he sought and found her slick entrance, sliding a finger past the taut barrier of her maidenhead to stroke the pulsing heat within. “Like this?”

She cried out, her fingernails digging into his forearms, her hips tilting to take him deeper, her inner muscles clenching around him. She was impossibly tight, hot, ready for him, her nectar slick on his fingers, the thought of what it would feel like to bury his cock inside her making him groan aloud, lust for her grinding hot and hard in his belly.

And then he could take no more.

He withdrew his finger from her, turned her to face him, stilling her with a kiss, his tongue thrusting into her mouth in imitation of the union to come. Then he sat back on a rock ledge and drew her down onto his lap, forcing her to straddle him, her legs spread wide, her breasts soft against his chest. He’d meant her first time to go slowly, meant to take her on the bearskin, but there was naught to do for it now. He’d wanted her for so long…

Barely able to drag his lips from hers, he drew back, lifted her chin, forced her to meet his gaze. Her palms resting on his shoulders, she looked at him through eyes smoky with desire, her breathing fast and shallow.

“There’s no turnin’ back from here, Amalie, so if you’re longin’ to go back to Bourlamaque, you’d best fight your way free from me and run. After this, I willna let you go. You’ll be mine in every way, and I yours, until our dyin’ day.”

Amalie felt a wild singing in her soul, her body longing to make their marriage complete. She reached up to cup his stubble-rough cheek, tears pricking her eyes, his gaze like fire. “
Oui, Morgan.
Make me yours.”

He said nothing but watched her with a raw hunger that made her heart skip, his eyes as dark as night, his fingers grasping her hips, lifting her, then guiding her downward.

And then she felt it—the thick tip of his sex nudging between her folds, pressing against her entrance, stretching her—and her insides clenched, either with pleasure or from fear, she wasn’t certain. For a moment time seemed to stand still, his gaze locked with hers, his sex poised on the brink of her innocence, his body rippling with tension. Then with one quick thrust, he breached her.

The pain was white-hot and sharp—but not nearly as bad as she’d expected. She gasped, felt herself pulse around him, and knew from the way his muscles tensed that he’d felt it, too, the intimacy of the moment shocking her to her soul—to know him like this, to feel what he felt, to be one with him.

“Easy,
mo leannan
.” He stroked her cheek, the tenderness of his gesture at odds with the strain in his voice. “The pain will soon pass. I willna hurt you again.”

“It is not bad.” She shifted her hips, moaning at the delicious feeling inside. “Oh!”

And then with a groan he began to move, rocking his hips upward, stretching her with slow, silky strokes, forcing more of himself inside her until she felt him against her womb, his sex filling her as she’d never been filled before, the pleasure of it staggering.

“Och, Jesus!” Never had Morgan felt more in control—nor so completely beyond it. Buried deep inside her honeyed heat, her body sheathing him so tightly, he was on the brink and yet he was nowhere near it. Letting her response guide him, he kept his thrusts steady and slow, not wanting to hurt her, certain that she must be raw where her flesh was so newly torn.

She was so tight. He’d never felt anything like it, her body resisting his intrusion, then closing around him like a silken fist. Maybe it was just knowing that she’d never been loved by another man, that she was his, body and soul. Or maybe it was that he loved her. Aye, he loved her, loved her so deeply that he thought his heart might shatter from it.

He watched her, watched the effect his loving had upon her. Gone was the lass who might have been a bride of Christ. Instead, he held
his
bride, a woman ripe with passion, her eyes half closed, her breasts and cheeks flushed, her lips parted, each breath unraveling on a moan that sounded like his name.

“Amalie, my angel.” With one arm around her hips and the other wrapped behind her back, he drew her closer, arching her backward, forcing her breasts up out of the water. Then he ducked down to take first one puckered crest into his mouth and then the other, suckling her, teasing the rose-petal softness with his teeth and tongue, gratified at her soft, shuddering gasps, at the way her nails bit deeper into his shoulders, at the way she tightened around him.

He quickened his rhythm, drew her hard against him, raining kisses on her lips, her cheeks, her forehead, his need for her pounding in his chest like the thunder of a heartbeat, the first hint of bliss dragging at his groin. It had been so long since he’d had a woman. So long.

But he couldn’t let go. Not yet.

He thrust deep and held himself inside her, then ground the thick root of his cock against her swollen sex. “Take it, Amalie! Come for me,
mo luaidh
!”

“Ô, mon Dieu!”
She clung to him, her body trembling. And then her breath broke—and the tension inside her shattered, her body arching against him with a cry.

He caught her cry with a kiss, felt her body clench rhythmically around him—and the last thread of his control snapped.

Amalie couldn’t believe what she was feeling, bliss shivering through her in ripples of molten gold, Morgan still moving within her, his thrusts prolonging her pleasure, her inner muscles tightening around him. And for the first time in her life she knew what it was to be complete, love for him swelling inside her, drawing tears to her eyes.

She heard herself call his name and felt his rhythm shift, his thrusts coming faster and harder, his strong arms around her, his body shaking with need. And even as he drove her toward a second stunning peak, it dawned on her just how much he’d been holding back, his own passion at last freed.

“Amalie, lass!” He called for her, desperation in his voice. “Oh, sweet Jesus!”

She clung to him, blinding pleasure claiming her again, sensations too good to be true washing through her in bright, shimmering currents, his deep, powerful strokes sending her flying. But this time he came with her.

She felt his body shudder, his face pressed against her throat as he groaned out the pleasure of it against her skin, spending himself deep inside her, their mingled cries lost in the music of the waterfall as the last rays of the setting sun turned the curtain of falling silver to blazing gold.

Chapter 25

M
organ combed Amalie’s wet hair, careful not to pull the tangles. Her eyes were closed, her head tilted to one side, a contented smile on her lips, her skin golden in the firelight. Still naked, she’d tucked the blanket beneath her arms and wrapped it around herself in a gesture of feminine modesty that he’d found charming and sweet.

Amalie. Sweet Amalie. His
wife.

Making love to her had been beyond anything he’d ever known. Aye, he’d tupped his fair share of lasses, enjoying the carnal pleasures they offered and giving back in full measure. But with Amalie, the bliss of it hadn’t stopped with his body. When he’d at last spent himself, he’d felt an ecstasy that had shaken him to his soul, drawing the very life from him and giving it back again.

Never had he felt so bound to another person. It wasn’t his vows that tied him to her, though they would have been enough. Nor was it the fact that he’d taken her maidenhead, though he would have honored such a claim from her as well, for he had taken something that he could never give back. Nor was it the fact that she might now carry his child, though certainly he’d have done his duty by her in that regard, too.

It was love that held him to her.

Now her happiness meant as much to him as his own, her safety and her life far more. He would no more have been able to abandon her than he could have abandoned himself. They were one, he and Amalie, in ways he never could have understood before this night. He’d thought he knew all there was to know about making love to a woman. He’d never understood that there was more, never understood what it truly meant for a man and woman to become one flesh. In that way, he’d been every bit as much a virgin as she.

’Twas a strange and humbling thought.

“Are you cold,
mo luaidh
?” He leaned down and kissed the curve of her shoulder, a feeling of tenderness in his chest that he’d never known before.

She gave a slow shake of her head. “No. The night is warm.”

The sun had long since set, the sky bright with stars, the forest alive with sound as the day creatures sought their beds and the night creatures began to wake.

“Shall I braid it for you?” He ran the comb through her hair once more, her tresses at last free of tangles.

She looked over her shoulder at him. “Do you know how?”

“Who do you think does these, lass?” He lifted one of his damp warrior’s plaits, unable to hide his amusement. “Connor perhaps? Killy? My Mahican grannies?”

She laughed, the sound of it sweet to his ears.

As he braided her hair for the night, he told her about her new home, about the strong and sturdy walls that would shelter her, about the trees that would be heavy with fruit come the harvest, about the rich earth, the fields and the forest, and all that they would yield for her. “You’ll ne’er go cold and hungry, I promise you that. Nor will you want for a man’s protection. Though I willna be able to stay wi’ you at first except when Wentworth gives me leave, Iain will watch over you as if you were his sister.”

Her brows drew together in a worried frown. “Are you certain I will be welcome?”

“Why ever would you no’ be welcome?”

“Your brother’s wife is loyal to Britain and a Protestant, is she not?”

“Aye, but Annie is no’ the sort to judge a person by their kin or their faith. If she were, she’d have no choice but to hate her husband and her own wee son, aye?”

But his words did not wipe the worry from her face. “Do not the British frown upon those of us of mixed blood? My skin is dark—”

“Your skin is lighter than mine, lass.” He finished binding the end of her braid with a beaded thong, then stretched out his arm alongside hers, his skin a dark sunbaked brown. “See? Besides, Iain is blood brother to the Mahican, just as I am. He and Annie harbor no hatred of Indian people, nor would they tolerate any who do. They are your family now, and they will love you. Did my men no’ receive you wi’ open hearts?”