Talon’s low rumble broke throughLara’s haze, and she licked her lips and focused her gaze on his.“Hmmm?”
He grinned, slow, sure, and so damnedmale that Lara melted in his hand.He pressed against her shoulderwith his other hand until she lay back on the blanket, then hecovered her body with his, keeping his weight on his elbows, histhick erection nestled in her bed of curls.
“Open for me, my beautifulrose,” he rasped.
Lara spread her legs to the warm,blunt tip of Talon’s probing cock and moaned as his flesh touchedhers.He kissed her eyes, her mouth, her neck as he began to moveagainst her, slowly pushing his cock just inside her and then out,tentatively repeating and testing her will to take him fully, thenpushing a little deeper, a little harder each time, until she wasmoving with him, desperate for the feel of him, all of him.Shegrasped his buttocks, and he thrust himself inside her.Lara gave alittle yelp at the quick, sharp tear of pain, and Talon stoppedmoving.
His gray eyes pierced hers.“Did Ihurt you?Do you want me to stop?”
“No.”She clung to him,craving him, craving more.“Don’t you dare stop now.”
She moved beneath him, and he movedwith her, sheathing himself deeper inside, filling her with a needshe never knew she had until him.She gave herself to his paceuntil all she knew, all she felt was him: his hands, his mouth, histaste, his scent—the friction of his skin against hers, his hardheat plunging and pulsing deep inside her, all feeling andsensation pooling at her core until she cried out with abone-melting release.
***
Talon
Talon sat gazing down atLara as she slept with her head in his naked lap, her slightlyparted lips red and swollen from his bruising kisses, her warmbreath tickling his sated cock.He pushed a damp curl from herforehead and kissed her brow, inhaling her musky sweet scent.Sheshivered, and he pulled the corner of the blanket up over hershoulders, sorry to cover her glorious nakedness.And shewasglorious, from herlush lips and sensuous mouth to her firm, full breasts, slim waist,and curvy hips, to her long, lean, shapely legs.Yet it wasn’t justher physical beauty that drew him to her, for she was asintelligent as she was beautiful, as rash as she was intelligent,as kindhearted as she was stubborn, and full ofsurprises.
The way she’d made love tohim—fiercely, passionately, holding nothing back—hadn’t surprisedhim in the least.It was who she was, how she lived her life.Whatdid surprise him was that she’d turned to him in the river, thatshe’d let him kiss her, let him make love to her,withher.What surprisedhim even more was the thought of what they’d doneasmaking love.He’dwanted many women in his life, and he’d had most of those he’dwanted.He’d lain with those women, had enjoyed carnal pleasureswith those women, many of them women of rank in one royal court oranother, and all of them experienced sexually.But he’d neverconsidered it making love until… Lara.
She nestled her nose intohis thigh, and Talon tucked the blanket around her legs, his cocktightening as he remembered the length of them wrapped around hiships.She slid her hand up his thigh, and Talon sat there in sweetagony, torn between wanting to let her sleep and aching to stir herand move her once more.He told himself it didn’t even matter thatRanulf had her first.That whelp wouldn’t know how to make love toa woman.Hell, he wouldn’t know how to make love to anybody oranything other than himself.What mattered to Talon was Lara hadcome to him tonight of her own free will, had made love tohim.
She’d turned to him to feel the livingwarmth of another being after watching so many others succumb todeath, as he’d turned to her.He was a battle-hardened soldier, andthe bloody aftermath of the ambush had unsettled him.It was onlyone of many such horrific scenes that would live forever in hismemory.He still remembered his first battle as if it wereyesterday, and today’s slaughter would haunt Lara for the rest ofher days.It was why he’d forbidden her to march with them, to keepher from witnessing the horrors of war, or worse, to be killedherself.Yet she’d been determined to come and had fooled him andforty other men until she’d given herself away in a fit of anger.His fierce wildcat.
She twitched, and Talon tucked theblanket tighter around her as it slid from her thighs.Dampnesscrept under his touch, and he drew away.A small stain on theblanket left a dark stain on his fingertips, and it carried thescent of copper.
Virgin’s blood?
That explained her little yelp whenhe’d first entered her, but not why she’d lied about Ranulf orbeing a virgin.Talon racked his brain trying to remember exactlywhat she’d said to him that day, and realized she hadn’t actuallytold him that Ranulf, or any other man, had been her lover.He’dassumed it, and she’d let him, never challenging his assumptionuntil the night Hamm had cracked Ranulf across the head with thepitcher.“He had no right,” she’d said as Hamm.“No right to besaying such things about her.”
Bloody hell.
Talon sat there cradling Lara, tryingto make sense of it, to comprehend what she’d given him thisnight.
“Nooo.”Lara cried out,her whole body jerking.“Oh God please.No.”
Startled, he held her tight as shethrashed from side to side.Her eyes flew open full of pure, primalterror.
“Lara, what is it?”Hefought to keep his voice level.To keep from squeezing her tootight.More than a little worried after her dream last night andthe massacre today.“What did you see?Tell me.”
Her eyes focused on his, and everysingle thing he’d felt making love to her was reflected back intheir depths.Then tears pooled her eyes.
“I can’t.”She shook herhead, sniffing back her tears, then pushed away and sat so theyweren’t touching.
What Talon wanted to do was pull herback, to hold her and kiss away her nightmare.To make love to heruntil nothing else mattered.What he did was take a deep breath andfollow Sophie’s advice.Lara had come to him this night of dreams,flesh, and coursing passion, and it had been more than worth thewait.He could wait until she came to him again.
“Come on.”He stood andheld a hand down to her.“We’d better get back to camp.”
***
Lara
Lara sat forward in the saddle,refusing to lean back into the comfort of Talon’s chest as sherelived her dream over and over again.Talon had fallen.In herdream, he’d slumped over the Black’s neck and slid off his saddle,boneless as a sack of grain onto an open field, where he lay in apool of blood, his eyes dulled and unseeing.After lying with him,having him so deep inside her that she could still feel him there,he had died.
Her body still flushed hot every timeshe remembered the feel of his hands, the taste of his mouth, hisskin, the hard heat of him pulsing inside her, and her mind reeledevery time she realized anew what she’d done.What they’d done.Oddly enough, she felt no shame, no regret, no sense of wrong.Rather, she was in awe of how right it had felt, how he’d known herbody better than she, how she’d responded to his.To him.For thefirst time, she truly understood how it could be between a man anda woman, and what she would lose when he left.She could only prayhe left her of his own volition, not as he had in herdream.
She knew he’d died a little today,that it’d cost him to look on the dead faces of so many of hisfellow soldiers, that it was this cold, dread ache they’d bothfelt, the emptiness they’d both needed to fill that had caused themto turn to each other for comfort, to warm their souls with theliving heat of the other.She knew this as she knew she couldn’tlie with him again, couldn’t make love with him again, and survivelosing him completely.