The Captive - By Joanne Rock Page 0,28
consider the implication of that. Instead, he dipped to kiss a place beneath her ear while he further loosened the ties of her gown. A vein in her neck jumped against his tongue and he stroked the spot with care until her head tipped back to give him more access.
The gift of her willingness did not escape him. He had no doubt that she’d been hurt before and it humbled him that she would allow him to touch her.
Would she be so trusting if she knew how much danger awaited them? Harold would pursue him relentlessly. Alchere would call upon King Alfred to help retrieve this woman.
“What is it?” She blinked at him, straightening.
Had she read his mind? Nay. He must have stilled somehow.
“Nothing.” He would not let dark thoughts spoil something that should be special for Gwendolyn. Something wild and passionate that would sweep her away on the waves of pleasure like a longship. “I only thought of your comfort. We should go in where there is a pallet and you will be warmer.”
Her assessing gaze studied him so hard that he feared she could see straight into his soul. But then, she shook her head.
“Nay.” She tugged on the blanket he’d given her earlier to keep her legs warm. “We can wrap ourselves in this and remain under the stars.”
Her unlikely proposition chased the last thoughts of an uncertain future from his mind, bringing him fully into the moment with her again.
“You have the spirit of a Dane,” he accused, unwinding the wool from her legs and then tossing it on the ground near the fire. “Wild at heart.”
He returned his mouth to her neck, lavishing long kisses there until she panted for breath. Then he carried her to the blanket and laid her upon it before stretching out beside her beneath the glittering heavens.
“Give me your hand.” She gripped the sleeve of his tunic, showing him what she wanted, and he followed her command, unsure what she had in mind.
As her tongue ran across the place where his blade had cut a thin line, he understood her purpose. She soothed the spot again and again, placing tender kisses there between more provocative strokes.
“The sting is long gone,” he assured her, wondering if she had any idea how those deliberate movements enflamed him. “The only ache I feel now is for want of you.”
She tensed, her shoulders stiffening as she drew in a small breath.
He’d briefly forgotten about her bastard of a husband, but something about his words had obviously brought her painful memories.
“Gwendolyn.” He released her, careful that his touches could never be construed as restraint. “It is a turn of phrase, no more. You could not hurt me if you tried. And a Dane never admits to suffering anyhow.” He thunked his chest with his fist in a gesture well-known among his men. “Invincible, you see?”
Her smile was like cooling rain after heated battle, a fresh beginning.
“Touch me more, Viking,” she demanded, propping her elbow on the blanket so that she could look down upon him as he lay on his back. “I begin to think I understand the kind of suffering you speak of. It began for me when you allowed the night air to chill my skin.”
She had wriggled free of the top half of her gown. With the laces loosened, the shoulders had slid off, leaving the heavy fabric to droop down to her waist. Now her arms and breasts were covered only by the under dress, a thin layer of linen that tempted him with intriguing shadows beneath the pale material.
He dragged cooling breath into his lungs like a drown ing man, his fingers itching for a comprehensive feel of her.
Then suddenly, his hands were all over her, cradling the sides of her breasts and palming their full, heavy weight. He stroked up the valley between them with two fingers, then bent to kiss that place. A moan tore free from her throat, but he felt it more than he heard it, the sound vibrating beneath his lips.
Gwendolyn wondered if she might be coming apart at the seams.
Not just her garments, which certainly were falling away as if of their own volition. But her.
Control slipped. Defenses flattened. Fear did not even exist. All of the dark emotions she’d stockpiled about men and—this—melted in the light of Wulf’s sworn vow, his sensual arrogance and his toe-curling kisses.
She hardly recognized herself, but she liked to think this daring side had always existed. She just