The Warrior Poet (36 page)

Truthfully, there
wasn't any point in maintaining the furious shame. What did it matter that
Quinton St. John had seen her naked; being a normal male, as Christian had so
eloquently described him, surely he had seen a naked woman before. Clearly, she
wasn't a sight out of the norm. Furthermore, what did it matter that Christian
had also seen her nude and exposed, her flesh displayed for all to see? He was seeing
her naked now.

When his tongue
began to stroke the curve of her dainty ear, her humiliation and fury
evaporated like a puff of smoke. Grinning with the thrill of his erotic touch,
she forgot all else in favor of his magnificent attentions.

"And how did
you know that?" she asked softly, turning onto her back and gazing into
his beautiful face. "You said yourself that you did not know who I
was."

"Mayhap I
didn't know factually, but I had a reasonable suspicion."

Her arms wound
themselves around his thick neck and she matched his knowing grin, devouring
the delicious lines of his angular features. "You suspected that I was a
de Gare?"

His massive arms
embraced her lanky, slender body, feeling the silken texture of her skin
against his flesh. "It was logical."

She rubbed her nose
against his affectionately, her smile broadening. "Then if you suspected
my heritage, why did you not kill me immediately?"

He continued to
gaze at her, wedging his thick legs between her thighs to ease his body weight
off her torso. Rubbing his nose against hers as she had done to him, more
gently on his second brush, his mouth hovered tauntingly above her fully ripe
lips.
"Because if I had, I would have never known the
pleasure of loving you."

His lips descended
upon her mouth before she could reply, suckling the breath and life and blood
from her very bones.
Gaithlin, her mind still swimming with
the impact of his softly-uttered confession, moaned low in her throat as she
responded wildly to his passion.
The further he kissed and stroked and
caressed, the hotter she became.

I would have never
known the pleasure of loving you.

Christian could not
believe he had admitted the emotions of his heart. But he had confessed
nonetheless, and he was not at all astonished to discover that he did not
regret his words. In fact, he found himself wondering why he had not admitted
it before this moment. Caught up in the heated strains of a most emotional
circumstance, it had been the natural thing to do.

As
natural as making love to her.
As his emotional demands matched the physical needs of
his voracious body, he gripped Gaithlin behind her long thighs and pulled her
knees up, winding her supple legs about his hips. Breaking away from her
delicious mouth, he gazed down at his heavy manhood as it pressed gently
against her tender core, watching with the greatest of excitement as their
bodies prepared to join.

Pleasure
and excitement for the both of them.
Gaithlin's fingers were anchored
deeply into his hair, feeling the newness of his throbbing member as it sought
her sensitive center. Christian's head blocked her view of the erotic spectacle
about to occur, but through her panting and maddening desire she could feel his
fingers as they alternately stroked her delicate folds and guided his manhood nearer
to its target.

Once brought to
bear, he seemed to slip into her virginal passage with amazing ease. They both
groaned with pleasure and surprise as he barely anchored himself an inch, but
it was an inch nonetheless. A very effortless inch, as she was literally
dripping with excitement and moisture from his expert attentions.

Christian could
hardly contain himself, but restrain he did; a painfully difficult employment
of his years of training in the art of self-control. Feeling the tiny muscles
contract around the ruby-red tip of his phallus was the greatest torture he had
ever known and he growled low in his throat, straining fervently against the
natural urge to drive into her. The pain, the pressure, the unbelievable
ecstasy was more than he could have possibly comprehended.

It was an
overwhelmingly supreme effort to move slowly, withdrawing himself and then
pressing into her again, gaining headway in minute quantities. He would have
been doing quite well with his controlled efforts had Gaithlin not writhed and
panted beneath him, fracturing his concentration and threatening to cast him
off the edge into the erotic abyss.

But he maintained
his composure, groaning softly with every new millimeter gained, feeling her
incredibly tight sheath drag at him, calling to him with the silent shout of
desire, and he considered it a monumental achievement that he had yet to fully
answer the call. With every miniscule progression gained, he felt as if he was
being reborn.

He was well aware
of the fact that his entire body was quaking with anticipation and powerfully
reined hunger. But his restrained held firm as he inched into her and he was in
the process of congratulating himself for his control when the unexpected
happened - in a blinding flash, he suddenly found himself seated to the very
hilt.

Gaithlin yelped
quietly with the force and swiftness of the action and Christian's eyes flew
open wide, his astonished expression coming to bear on Gaithlin's taut face. He
froze, poised above her, as she struggled to catch her breath. Her clawed
hands, gripping his rock-hard buttocks, dug crescent-shaped wounds into the
flesh.

It took him a
moment to realize she had impaled herself upon his rod of iron. He had been
aware of her long, slender body wrapping itself about him tightly, her hands to
his buttocks, but he hadn't imagined that she had possessed another purpose in
mind other than to simply brace herself for the inevitable stab of pain as her
maiden's barrier was breached. He would have laughed at her boldness had he not
been shocked with the concept that she had thrust her pelvis forward in an
attempt to capture the entire length of his throbbing maleness.

"What... what
did you do?" he demanded, scarcely able to speak.

She licked her
lips, squirming uncomfortably beneath him. "I was tired of waiting,"
she whispered, her deep blue eyes meeting him with a certain degree of guilt.
"I am sorry, Christian. But... but you were torturing me with your
prolonged pace and I was eager to be done with the pain I knew was yet to come."

His brow furrowed
faintly. "So you thought to hurry me along?"

She shrugged,
wrapping her legs more tightly about his hips. "The anticipation of my
maiden's agony was unbearable," she said softly. "Are you
angry?"

He shook his head,
chuckling weakly. "Nay, my lady, I am not," kissing her nose, he
shifted his weight and braced his powerful arms on either side of her slender
body. "In fact, your bravery is amazing. Imagine when I boast that my wife
took her own virginity with the aid of my manhood. Certainly, there is
something strange to that declaration."

She giggled, the
stabbing sting radiating from her groin lessening by the moment. "It will
be our secret."

He matched her
grin. "Indeed. I would be embarrassed to admit that you did my job for
me."

She twisted again,
still smiling as she attempted to find a measure of comfort within the fading
pain. "You did all of the work, my dearest Demon. I will avow the fact
'til I meet my grave."

He gazed deeply
into her eyes, watching her face as he slowly withdrew from her deliciously
snug sheath. Their
smiling
 
expressions
faded as he thrust into her again, very slowly,
seating himself to the hilt with tender force. Beneath him, Gaithlin shuddered
with ecstasy and Christian watched, entranced and overwhelmed, as her large
nipples hardened in response to his physical demands.

It was as he had
always imagined it be, greater than he could have every imagined it to be. As
with the very first time he had seen her, fantasizing the sensations of her
supple legs wrapped around his body in passion, her incredibly responsive body
reacting to his unspoken desires, the excitement was almost more than he could
withstand. His thrusts increased, feeling her body pull at him, the friction
building greater than any he had ever known.

As the scorching
heat between them mounted to giddy heights, Gaithlin found herself completely
upswept in the newness that was erotic ecstasy. Knowing now what it meant to
couple with a man and wondering in the same breath if every experience would be
as wondrous as the first.
 

Truthfully, beyond
the pain of losing her innocence, she hadn't known what more to expect, which
was why with every thrust, every withdrawal, she was pulled deeper and deeper
into a world where Christian was lord and master over her world. Where very
breath she took depended upon his skill as a lover
and
 
were
every beat of her heart was
reliant upon his amazing physical prowess.

As the sun rose
upon the deep green countryside, Christian took his captive to heights never
before mastered. For Christian and Gaithlin, there was only one world worth
existing in - theirs. When the pinnacle of their passion was finally unleashed,
Gaithlin's screams of surprised and euphoria echoed off the mighty Scot pines,
intermingled with the unearthly growls of the Demon's pleasure.

 
As Malcolm lingered fearfully outside of the
shelter door, wondering if the lady and her English knight had somehow managed
to harm each other in the midst of their vocal struggle, he was wise enough to
realize that entering the shack would not be the correct decision. Whatever
transpired, he would wait until the warlord was calm before interjecting his
defense of the lady. Even though he had come to adore Christian, the man was
still inherently frightening.

Unaware of
Malcolm's dilemma outside the hut, Gaithlin struggled to recover her composure
as she nestled within the powerful embrasure of Christian's arms. Cradled
against his magnificent, sweaty chest, her mind was a maelstrom of warm, giddy
thoughts.

"Christian?"
she murmured.

His face was buried
in the side of her head, dozing lightly from his most wondrous experienced.
Truthfully, if the physical act itself had somehow managed to kill him, he
wouldn't have cared in the least. As it was, he found himself perpetually
amazed by the raw sweetness of it and he almost felt as if he, too, had been a
virginal innocent before embarking on the most amazing erotic voyage of his
life.

"Hmm?" he
mumbled, exhausted and spent.

"Did you mean
what you said earlier?"

Removing his face
from her hair, he shifted so that she was lying beside him, crushed against his
mighty chest. "What's that, honey?"

"That you
consider it a pleasure to love me," she repeated softly, running gentle
fingers over the bleached matting of fuzz covering his chest.

"Good Christ,
yes."

She gazed up at his
half-lidded expression, her deep blue eyes wide with wonder and warmth.
"Did you mean in the physical sense or the emotional sense?"

"Both."

She continued to
gaze at him, her slender fingers moving from his chest to his face.
Touching the man who had shown her the true meaning of life.
"Are you saying that you love me, Christian? As a man loves a woman?"

He met her gaze,
knowing that he had already admitted as much in the last tender moments before
he claimed her as his own. "As a man loves a woman,” he murmured.
“As a husband loves a wife."

She smiled faintly,
running her fingertips over his lips, watching as he tenderly kissed them.
"I love you, too."

The corner of his
lips twitched, the only outward indication of the soaring joy threatening the
very fibers of his composure.
I love you, too.
Good Christ, was it
possibly the truth? Was it possible that she was experiencing the same
unrestrained adoration he had been wallowing in for the better part of a week?

He wanted to
believe her. He was afraid to believe her. Christian's hands began to shake as
he stroked the length of her delicate shoulder. "You say that because I
have declared my love for you?"

"Nay.
I say it because
it is the truth. I cannot remember when I have not loved you."

His gaze was
steady, the flicker of unfathomed emotion burning deeply within the ice-blue
eyes. "I remember," his voice was raspy with the power of his
sentiment, weak with the growing realization that his most overwhelming feelings
were freely returned. Of course he believed her; he could see the undeniable
sincerity in her eyes.
"The day I whisked you from St.
Esk.
You tried to kill me."

She laughed softly,
bringing her lips close for a gentle kiss. "You scared me to death, you
and your horde of St. John soldiers. Had I possessed the strength and the
means, I truly would have killed all of you."

He kissed her
again. "There, you see? You have not always loved me."

She lifted her
eyebrows as if to admit his correct assessment, a long finger toying with his
shoulder-length hair. "Are you going to write of this day in your
chronicles?"