Heart Duel (22 page)

So his heart was light. His body wasn't. He crushed her into the sofa. He winced. More care was needed there, too. Taking her fast, uncontrolled on the sofa, he hadn't considered her delicate body except to feel it beneath his, around his.

Still, he'd never experienced anything more powerful in his life than his release. He didn't know how he could keep away from her now. He'd forgotten every syllable of his mantra of control and suspected that he'd remember the words only out of her presence. With her, he would always fight for restraint, and he feared it would be a constant battle he'd always lose.

When he could move, he stood. His brain was too scrambled for the complex calculations required to port them to her bedsponge. He looked down at her and all his blood pooled in his groin. His mouth dried.

The bright red couch framed her pale, dainty body. He'd been too gripped in passion to notice anything but the creaminess of her rounded thighs and the heaven that lay between. She was well-made with small bones, full breasts, narrow waist, welcoming hips. Her thick black hair tumbled to her shoulders, contrasting with the purple of her eyes, the rosy crowns of her breasts. Near the edge of his vision was a rose the exact same shade as her lips, her nipples, the flesh peeking through the black triangle of hair.

Stretching, he plucked the rose from the vase, stripped it of thorns with a Word, and tossed it upon her. Droplets of water beaded on her abdomen and she shivered. His aim had been true. The full blossom lay just above her tight right nipple.

Desire started a drumbeat cadence within him. The sight of her seared the memory of every other woman from his mind.

“Yes,” his voice came thick. “Exactly the same color.”

She blinked, and the cloudiness in her eyes cleared as she glanced down. And she blushed. Her cheeks, still pink with passion, flushed redder, and the blush flowed down her torso.

Delight mixed with desire in him. He bent and scooped her into his arms. “This time, the bedsponge,” he managed. He decided if he hurried, kisses could wait. If he started kissing her here, it wouldn't be the sofa again, it would be the floor.

At least he hadn't tumbled her to the floor. He ran to her bedroom, got an impression of a coral bedspread splashed with red poppies before he tore the thing aside and placed her on cream-colored sheets.

He caught his breath. Now the only color he saw was her hair and her eyes, the rose matching her nipples. He moaned, feeling his sex thicken and throb and rise, ready again. He'd been sure he could go slowly this time. He reached for the wisps of his mantra that eluded him when her eyelids lowered and she licked her lips.

Kissing. He remembered that much. His lips ached, nearly as much as his shaft, for the taste of her. He'd never kissed her after she'd climaxed. Surely her fulfilled passion would change the taste of her mouth and her skin.

He settled himself on his side next to her, groaning as his sex brushed her thigh. He held himself still until he regained a shred of discipline. He wanted to love her slowly. He hoped he could. His fingers traced the curve of her shoulder. Her body was beautiful, unflawed. Unscarred. Suddenly he was aware of his many scars, scars that emphasized the differences between them. She, a Healer, would never scar. He, a fighter, would gain scars by the year.

She touched his cheek with fingertips. “Holm,” she said.

His name on her lips, spoken with tenderness and desire, shot through him, moving him as nothing ever had before.

“That's my name,” he said, slipping his hand behind her head to encompass the nape of her neck, raise her head, and bring her lips close for his mouth. He caressed her lips and tempted her to open them, then his tongue plunged into her mouth to conquer just as his body had claimed hers moments before. The need to bury himself again in her and link them physically, intimately, rushed through him, and he grabbed at self-restraint.

He opened the bond between them, wide, and found what pleased her most. When he sucked on her tongue, her whimper of pleasure pushed him to a new level of heated desire.

Slowly he withdrew from her mouth, and she raised her head to follow him, to rub his lips with her own, to tangle tongues in his mouth, and he knew when she trembled in delight at his taste.

It nearly undid him. Every second tested him.

He lifted his head, breaking the kiss, and glided his lips down the curve of her jaw to the hollow of her throat. Skin damp with perspiration greeted him, a touch of perfume and her own elusive taste. Not enough. Other places of her body would have their own tastes, and he needed to imprint them on his memory, to know in his soul every aspect of her taste. Something HeartMates knew, he now understood.

He would learn every note and tone of her voice. Every tint of her skin. Every scent of her body. Every millimeter of her under his hands, every sensation of her skin against his.

And he would start with taste.

Her heart slowed a bit and she shifted in surprise as she realized his intentions. Pink embarrassment fuzzed her mind.

He took in the fragrance and sweetness of the top of her breasts, touching on the tips and swirling his tongue to know this taste, reveling when her body arched to his mouth. Ah, he could tempt her with the pleasures he could teach her, he thought triumphantly—with wonder she was so unschooled in the many levels of passion.

Her essential taste was slightly stronger between her breasts and on the underside of them. He spent some time there, then nibbled with questing tongue to her belly.

Her hands curved around his shoulders and tugged. Her embarrassment was endearing, but irrelevant. He was on a mission.

From her thoughts, he knew that her husband had never tasted her womanflesh, never cherished it with his mouth, never brought her to ecstasy in that way. And she'd had no other lover.

Through his own thoughts he let her know the challenge was too much to resist, that nothing would stop him, that he would touch her as no other man had, body, mind, and heart.

His hands caressed her, exploring the curves and dips of her body, liking the fine turn of her collarbone, the soft smoothness of her skin, and the velvet plush of her nipples. He reveled in the sensations he gave her. She'd never forget his mouth or his touch.

She tugged on his hair, exciting him more.

He chuckled as he tasted more sweet Bélla-essence below her hipbones, held her wriggling body and sent the bolts of lust he felt through their tie until she quieted and her breathing came ragged and her heart pounded in the same beat as his own.

The scent and taste of her at the apex of her thighs pulled a growl from him. He smelled her, his woman. And he smelled himself, his mark on his woman, his seed, the results of the ecstasy they found together, and it was the most perfect smell in the universe. Once more his primal nature swamped all reason.

She lay still as if his emotions pulsing through their bond overwhelmed her. No remnant of embarrassment, only surrender to his touch and his will mixed with the rising passion twisting inside her.

Moving his hands from her hips to her thighs, he spread them wide. Up close he admired her womanly folds and the glistening proof of their union. He recalled the rose that matched the color of her most intimate flesh and 'ported it to just above her sex. He trembled at the sight.

With the utmost delicacy, he traced her with his tongue and her perfume exploded in his brain, demolishing all control. He reveled in the scent and taste and renewed moistness and softness against his face and arching of her body against his lips and the thundering in their blood and the swelling of his shaft and the demand of his own sex until she screamed and he tasted her climax and the instinct to mate seized him.

He rose and watched himself surge into her. The ripples of her body clasping him ignited the firestorm of orgasm.

As soon as his brain cleared from the most magnificent event of his life, Holm rolled to his side and pulled a limp and unresisting Bélla into his arms, curving his body around her. Shocks of renewed pleasure shivered through them both as their skin touched. He noted the wondering and sleepy tone of her mind and decided a nice little intimate nap would foster the complete bond that continued to weave them together.

“Sleep,” he whispered in a dark voice he knew could mesmerize. The fog of gray creeping over her thoughts thickened. “Sleep, you are safe with me, Bélla.”

“Safe,” she murmured.

“Cherished,” he said.

“Cherished?” Her mind started to spark with thought.

“Welcome,” he amended.

A slight laugh came from her. “You're welcome, too, Holm.” She snuggled a little and fell asleep.

Finally relieved from the sexual pressure of the last several days, Holm slept.

He woke a septhour later with Bélla still in his arms. It was a very good sign that she hadn't moved away from him in her sleep. Unconsciously, she must know they were HeartMates. Now all he had to do was convince her mind. He wished he'd thought to initiate the HeartBond, but that took one more thought than he'd had.

Unable to keep his hands to himself, he curved one hand around her hip and cupped her breast with the other, calculating how much more of the afternoon he could afford to while away with loving. Something furry moved against his hand on Bélla's breast, and he recognized Meserv, also cuddled against her. From the foot of the bedsponge came Phyll's quiet snuffling.

Under his touch, Bélla awoke and stretched. When Holm brushed her mind, she refused entrance.

She was going to be difficult.

Fourteen

Holm sighed, then caught sight of the wreath that one of the
kittens had dragged from Lark's mainspace to the bedroom's threshold and frowned. If he hadn't placed a spell on the piece, it would have been ruined.

She hadn't protected it. She'd made the wreath with particular flowers signaling that she was willing to have an affair with him, no more. He scowled.

Lark drew away and he turned her to face him. At least she didn't resist that. Her expression showed vulnerability before she shuttered it, and tenderness welled.

“The blooms are wrong, Bélla,” Holm muttered. He reached out to toy with glossy black strands of her hair, assessing how soon he could love her again and what position he'd try.

“Hmmmm?” she said, shifting. Her breasts plumped out on the bedsponge, and made his voice fail and thoughts vanish.

He sucked in a breath to savor the lingering scents of the room, his woman and himself and their joining, the fragrance of roses and the faint hint of the spicy flowers that graced his wreath. Ah, the wreath.

He cleared his throat. Her deep purple eyes met his. “Your wreath speaks of desire.”

She smiled smugly and her eyelids dropped. The tips of her fingers touched his chest, trailed against him as if enjoying the consistency of his hair. “Yes,” she said. “Flaming desire. Hot passion. Greedy sex, or sexy greed.” She laughed up at him, tilting her head. He appreciated the smooth line of her long white throat. “I'm a little befuddled,” she ended.

He'd never seen her so soft and relaxed and open. So he hesitated to bring up a subject that might push her away, but he wanted her to know that he'd be in her bed that night.

He inhaled again and refused to let the exquisite scent distract him. “Yes. Passion. Desire. But”—he narrowed his eyes as he tried to recall the flowers that spoke of something more. The quickly fading flowers. The short-lived flowers.

Catching her chin in his fingers, he watched her eyes open wide and note his seriousness. “But intertwined with the An'Alcha passionflowers are dayferns, fragile Moonbeams. Flowers that die in a few hours.”

She arched her brows. “Yes?”

“This is not a simple affair, Bélla. Not short.”

Wariness came to her eyes and he hated putting it there.

At that moment the music swelled from soft and steady to singing joy.

“The music,” he said, working for smooth words to say to a woman for the first time in his life.

“It's lovely,” she responded as she had earlier in the day.

He looked steadily at her. “It's new. Composed by my Mamá just last night when I informed her I was courting a woman to be my—wife.”

Shock jolted through Lark. “Wife?” she squeaked. She squeezed Meserv too hard and he mewed a protest. She didn't know what to think. Of course Holm would need a wife to carry on the Family name.

“I'm serious, Bélla. And my intentions are honorable.”

She caught her breath. “Our problems are insurmountable.”

He opened his mouth.

“No,” she said. “I don't want to have this conversation naked in bed with you. This is serious.”