Beneath a Midnight Moon - By Amanda Ashley Page 0,42

forced the words from a throat gone suddenly dry.

“Don’t what, lady?”

“Don’t defile me.”

He cocked his head to one side, his gray eyes glittering. “Do you think I would take you against your will?”

“No,” she said, her voice barely audible. “But I fear you could make me want you with very little effort.”

Hardane stared at her, his heart accelerating at her words. “You do want me,” he replied, his tone confident. “You want me as I want you.”

Kylene nodded. There was no point in arguing, nothing to be gained by lying, not when he could read her thoughts.

“Lady, there’s something I should tell you.”

“Tell me, then.”

“Kylene, I . . .” Slowly, he shook his head. He couldn’t tell her, not now. Instead, he leaned toward her, his gray eyes blazing.

Knowing it was wrong, Kylene lifted her face for his kiss.

He didn’t close his eyes as his lips covered hers, nor did she.

She felt the heat of his kiss, saw the bright flames of passion that burned in the depths of his eyes, felt his hands clasp her shoulders. She knew then that she would never return to the Sisterhood, that she was truly bound to this man who could divine her innermost thoughts, who had the power to make her heart soar and her soul rejoice.

Hardane felt the change in her, felt the walls she had built between them fall away, and knew she would be his. A low moan of pained pleasure rumbled in his throat as he drew his lips from hers.

“You have accepted me at last,” he murmured, ignoring the voice of his conscience that chided him for being a coward, for not telling her who and what he was.

His fingertips traced the curve of her cheek, and then he kissed her again, savoring the taste of her lips. “Tell me,” he whispered, “tell me that you’ll be mine.”

“I will be yours,” she replied breathlessly. “I think I have always been yours.”

His smile warmed her as nothing else could. Exultantly, he swept her into his arms and crushed her to his chest, his arms tight around her, his desire for her evident in every taut line of his hard, muscular body.

“Kylene, ah Kylene.”

He said her name again and again, the sound filling the room like a prayer and a promise.

Dizzy with happiness, she stared deep into his eyes, wondering if he would make love to her now.

Slowly, Hardane shook his head. “I want to,” he said, answering her unspoken thought. “I have wanted you since the day I first saw you, but I cannot. Not now.”

Reluctantly, he let her go, his hands curling into tight fists as he fought to keep from laying her back on the bed and burying himself in her sweetness. A low groan that was almost a growl rumbled in his throat as he fought down the urge to possess her, to learn the secrets of a woman’s love.

“Go to sleep, Kylene.” He forced the words through clenched teeth.

“Perhaps I should go back to my own room,” she suggested.

“No. I don’t want you to be alone.” He drew a ragged breath. “I’ll sit there,” he said, pointing to the window seat on the far side of the room. “Try to get some rest.”

For a moment, she sat there staring up at him. It didn’t seem right that she should take his bed and she was about to say so when something in his gaze warned her to keep still and do as she was told.

“Good sleep, my lord,” she murmured, and crawled under the covers, pulling the blankets up to her chin.

“Good sleep, lady,” he replied, knowing that he would not find any rest this night, not with her lying there in his bed.

Already her scent seemed to fill the room. And her thoughts, uncertain, filled with a yearning for that which she didn’t understand, played havoc with his imagination.

With a great effort of will, he drew his thoughts from Kylene and focused instead on the darkness that had hovered in her room, a blackness fraught with evil. It might have been a sorcerer’s spell, he mused, or the ghost of some ancient inhabitant of Castle Argone, and yet he knew instinctively that it had been neither one. It had been the essence of a dark vengeful soul, a festering, palpable hatred that had been directed at Kylene.

But why?

In the morning, Kylene woke to find herself alone in Hardane’s bedroom. A dress had been placed on the foot of the bed, along with the