Her short tirade earned her his laughter, and he signed, "You plan to get away from me in any way you can, don't you?"
"Of course. You're holding me hostage," she said.
"You not...hostage," he responded in English. "You wife."
"Barely."
"What word mean?"
"It means as soon as possible I will...I will..." She shut her eyes and breathed in deeply. "I can't say it."
"It good...you cannot say it."
She glanced away from him. "Are you going to untie my hands?"
"Saa."
"Then, how am I to attend to my needs?"
"I will...help."
"You will not!" For goodness sake, the man certainly had his gall.
He said in English, "Then, you...promise."
Frowning, she shook her head and glanced back at him. "This is blackmail."
"What...'blackmail'?"
"It's...it's...knowing something a person has done that's bad, and the one person, having found out about it, threatens the other person to make their bad deeds known to everyone unless the person does some deed this one person wants."
He merely shrugged and brought his arms up, crossing them and placing them over his chest. "This not blackmail. You not do...bad. What I want...simple. Want...your promise not run away."
"Oh, very well," she answered. "I promise I will not run away tonight."
He grinned at her. "It not...for tonight," he said. "It forever."
"I will not say it. Either untie my hands on my promise to not run away tonight, or I'll figure out how to do what I must on my own." She held her hands out in front of her again.
But, instead of untying the knots—as she'd expected he would—he reached out and brought up her hands, still tied, to his lips and kissed every one of her fingers, first with his lips and then added his tongue to the caress. But he didn't stop there. He spread his sweet kisses to encompass her palms, also.
"Don't," she said, but she let out a tiny cry of joy, silently moaning.
As though her cry were an encouragement, he trailed his kisses up one of her arms to her neck, then down to her chest, where he paid tribute to each of her breasts through the cloth of her dress, and, were he not holding onto her around the waist, she might have collapsed, for she had bent backward, had thrown back her head and closed her eyes. But, he wasn't through with her, and, kissing his way to her other arm, he caressed and grazed it, too, showering her with his touch all the way to her palm and her fingers.
He said, "Want make love to you, my woman."
She groaned, and he brought her hands, still tied, up over his head, placing them around his neck. Pulling her in closely, he murmured, "Love me."
"I cannot," she murmured. "I am too upset with you to make love to you. Besides, you are wearing much too much armor. I thought you couldn't make love when you are at war."
"I not at war. Not yet. We still safe...in valley."
"You look like you are going to war. There are so many weapons on your person, how do you expect me to even hug you?"
"Like this." Picking her up, he left the horses to their grazing and stepped back into a denser part of the woods. Still holding her, he leaned her up against the smooth, yet stringy bark of an old, fragrant ponderosa. Next, he placed her legs around his waist, and from there it took him only a moment to slide both his and her clothing out of the way.
She gave him no resistance, even though she thought she ought to. But, she was beyond complaining. Instead, when he touched her privately, she melted against him, inviting him, despite herself, to love her there.
