This time the pace was faster, and she met it, her pain now gone and desire taking its place. Passion took her, obliterating the room around her to leave only the two of them, just as they’d said. Together, they discovered a rhythm that bound their bodies in a time that was their own and offered a harmony unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Every part of her clenched, and pleasure cascaded through her, the ecstasy nearly drowning her. She gasped with the sweet agony of it, even as he captured her mouth with his once more. But this time, this time, it was to silence his own cry, which filled her as his seed did. She felt the warmth of him, the life of him. And in that moment, she wanted to have his heart and to give him hers.
Her body melted against his, and he flooded her world. They panted against each other, hearts pounding, bodies slick from their efforts. After their breathing quieted and her heart settled, he rolled off her and the bed to his feet, padded away, and came back with a damp rag and his plaid. And then, to her utter astonishment, he draped the plaid over her as he cleaned her. When he was done, he motioned to the bed silently, and she knew what he intended. She scooted off, he tugged off the coverlet, and she turned her back as his footfalls echoed to the door. It creaked open, he murmured something, and then he came behind her once more, arms encircling her.
She had never felt so protected in her life. His heart pounded against her bare back, and it made her smile. She had affected him. He rested his chin on top of her head for a moment before he turned her slowly to face him. “I love your body,” he said, sliding his hands up her stomach and over her breasts.
She smiled up at him, replaying his words in her mind and wondering what it would feel like to have him say he lovedher, what it would feel like to tell him the same, to be gripped by such emotion and tethered so completely to another. She wanted that with him, and she felt tiny ties to him already—ties of trust, respect, passion, awe. Love had to feel like an indestructible chain that bound two people. She bottled it all inside her for the day they would eventually say it to each other. That day had to come, didn’t it?
“I suppose my breasts are yer favorite part of my body?” she asked, arching her eyebrows at him.
“No.” He shook his head and dropped his hands, capturing one of hers as he did so. He led her back to the bed, and they climbed onto it together. They lay with her on her back, and him facing her, his head resting in the palm of his hand. “Your eyes are my favorite part,” he said and leaned over to kiss her eyelids. “And then your lips.” His mouth captured hers for a kiss that caused her emotions to whirl and skid. “And your neck.”
She laughed. “My neck?”
He nodded and brought his finger to the hollow space between her collar bones, where she could feel her own heart beating. “Well, really right here where I can see your pulse, so fast, so alive.”
She pressed a hand on top of his fingers that rested between her collarbones. Was he thinking of her? Amanda? And how she was dead, and Deirdre was alive? “Do ye wish it was her here?” she asked, the words just slipping out.
His gaze came to her, a collision of agony and need. “No,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse. “I don’t. And I hate myself for it.”
She started to pull away, cursing herself a thousand times for mentioning Amanda, for ruining their moment together. He held her by the arm, his grip tight. “When we were together, it was just the two of us. I promise you, she wasn’t in my head at all.”
She nodded, biting back the words in her mind that she was in his heart. Amanda should be there still. Deirdre would like to think that if they were in love and then she died, Reikart would not forget her. He would carry her in his heart. There was room to love more than one person in a lifetime, wasn’t there?
Chapter Nineteen
Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining.
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “The Rainy Day”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Rhys demanded the minute the solar door closed. It was late afternoon the following day, and it was finally only Reikart and his brother.
Reikart stalked around the room like a caged tiger. He’d fought all morning and all afternoon with swords and daggers, taking hits and humiliation while learning the art of medieval weaponry. But his temper had snapped finally when someone had made a snide comment about his hurrying back to bed his new wife again.
“Connor was joking with you,” Rhys said from behind him.
Reikart jerked a hand through his hair, wincing at his burning knuckles, which were cracked from putting his fists into Connor’s face. “You know I don’t like locker-room talk, especially not about Dee.”
“Dee, is it?”
“Screw you,” Reikart snapped, still feeling the overwhelming desire to hit something… hard.
“You’re trying to outrun something that’s impossible to escape,” Rhys said.
“Is that so, oh wise one? What am I trying to escape?” His chest squeezed suddenly when Deirdre appeared in the courtyard below in a dark-green gown that contrasted vividly with her hair.
“Yourself.”
Reikart pressed his head against the cold glass of the small window and squeezed his eyes shut. He rolled his head from side to side, wanting to roll the thoughts right out of it. “I’m falling for her.”
“Is that such a bad thing?”
“Yes!” Reikart roared, coming around to face Rhys, who stood within striking distance. “I don’t want to fall for her.”
“I think you do,” Rhys said.
“Shut the hell up, Rhys,” Reikart growled, his head pounding with anger. “I think I know what the hell I want, and I don’t want to fall for Deirdre!”
