her head back into the linens, straining into the joy of each thrust as he plunged his flesh repeatedly into hers. “This is why you need me as well. We should have married, you and I. All those years ago … we should have married.”
“We would have killed each other by now,” he grunted. “One way or another.”
“Ahh, but what a sweet death it would have been, locked together, bound together in ecstasy forever. Admit it, damn you. Admit you have never found another woman who can satisfy you as I do!”
Lucien admitted nothing, not in so many words. His body, however, spoke eloquently, surging deeper, harder, faster; held in her pulsing grip, driven by the passion raging through every vein, muscle, and tautened sinew.
Nicolaa’s nails drew ragged red gouges on his flesh as she raked them from his shoulders to his flanks. She levered her hips higher, and watched his handsome face contort in the firelight. Spasms wracked his body, rendering him as helpless and vulnerable as a babe in arms and she knew she could have stabbed a dagger into his heart at that moment and he would not have been aware of the threat. She could have slashed his throat or signaled to someone concealed in the shadows to attack him from behind, and he would not have suspected the danger until it was too late.
He should not take me for granted, she thought darkly. Nor should he doubt for a moment that I would hesitate to kill—as I have done before—in order to get what I desire most in life. A nubile young bride keening her pleasure beneath him, she most certainly did not desire. She knew full well a steady stream of girls, women, wenches, and whores frequented his sleeping couch, but never, not once had he ever contemplated marriage. Not even when the dower lands of a proposed match could have doubled or trebbled his present wealth. So why this one?
Nicolaa had seen the widow De Briscourt. Tiny as a bird, delicate as a blush, as blonde and dewy with youth as the early morning sunlight.
What if Lucien saw her and … and …?
The moan that welcomed the panting, drained mass of spent ecstasy back into her arms was not entirely feigned. She held him and combed her fingers through his damp blond locks, savouring every last shiver and shudder that racked the mighty body.
Nicolaa was not going to lose him again. Not this time. She had been patient all these years, tolerant of the need for discretion and caution. But there was no one now who would dare point a finger at the Baron de Gournay and remind him his father had been branded a traitor, his brother slain as a murderer. The last of his line, he had succeeded in overcoming the taint of both tragedies. He was Richard’s trusted ally and Prince John’s confidant; the time for patience was rapidly drawing to an end. She would have her great golden warlord. She would live at Bloodmoor Keep as its mistress, and she would remove without qualm anything or anyone who stood in her way!
4
It seemed to Servanne that outrage upon outrage was to be heaped upon her for as long as she was expected to endure the outlaw’s company. Not only was she being forced to join them in defiling the holy ground of the ruined abbey, but she was also pressed into taking part in further indignities. Scarcely had she been permitted the luxury of scrubbing the grime and dampness of the forest off her face and hands, when she was summoned to join the motley band of renegades while they consumed their evening meal. An adamant refusal was met, moments after it was relayed, by the appearance of the Black Wolf himself in the doorway of the tiny, windowless cubicle that had once been a monk’s sleeping chamber. A clear warning was delivered: refuse again and she would be thrown over his shoulder and carried to the dinner table.
Her eyes red-rimmed from weeping, her body aching and bruised in too many places to recount, Servanne accompanied the rogue to the long pilgrims’ hall, the only building of the three still boasting a partial roof, and the one that had obviously been taken over as living and sleeping quarters for the band of outlaws. To complete her humiliation, Servanne de Briscourt was seated, as guest of honour, with the Black Wolf and half a dozen of his more important henchmen