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His hand grabbed her forearm to spin her back. “How many times has he held you in his arms?” he demanded.
“He hasn’t,” Lorna denied.
His other hand brushed her cheek the way Bull’s had. “I suppose that was the first time he touched you, too,” he mocked.
“It was, but I’m certainly not going to try to convince you of that,” she declared, and jerked away from the derisive caress of her face.
“How many times has he been here when I’ve been gone?” He twisted her arm to pull her closer while his cold eyes narrowed on her.
“That question doesn’t deserve an answer,” she spat, and turned her arm sharply in an attempt to break his painful grip. “Let go of me. I want to go to bed.”
His fingers closed on the straight neckline of her thin chemise. With a downward stroke of his hand, he ripped it off as Lorna breathed in sharply from shock. She struggled frantically when he scooped her naked body into his arms, kicking and hitting at him with desperate little sounds coming from her throat. The bruising grip of his arms didn’t hold her long as he dropped her onto the bed.
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” he growled.
For a stunned moment she lay there looking up at the labored movement of his chest, unable to believe he hadn’t intended to rape her again. It was that kind of violence she saw in his face. Just when she was about to accept she was wrong, he lowered himself onto the bed, using his weight to pin her to the mattress. Twisting and writhing, Lorna tried to throw him off her, clawing at him with her nails.
He caught her hands and forced them above her head, holding her wrists easily in the shackling grip of one hand. Helpless now, Lorna turned her face from him and closed her eyes tightly. The fight went out of her as she began breathing in silent sobs and tried to shut her mind to the violation of her body.
Yet the hand stroking her was not cruel and the hard mouth moving along the hollow of her collarbone was not brutal. He held the weight of her breast in his palm and began moistening its firm swell with warm kisses. She trembled with uncertain desire when he took the nipple into his mouth and rolled his tongue around it until it hardened to an erect nub. His teeth nibbled at it, sensuously tugging at it.
Her breath started coming in tiny pants, reluctant with passion that might be misspent. Lifting his head, he watched his hand explore where his lips had been. His weight shifted partially off her.
“Has he touched you like that, Lorna?” Benteen murmured.
“No,” she moaned.
Her wrists twisted under his pinning hold, but he wouldn’t release them. His hand began wandering over her rib cage and across the flatness of her stomach. Then he was bending to explore her navel, her toes tingling with the sensation his tongue created. He ran his hand over her naked flank, gliding to her knee and curving behind it to raise it. When his fingers began making a teasing trail along the inside of her thigh, the small sound that came from her throat was an articulate expression of aching desire.
“Can he make you feel like this?” Benteen asked, and rubbed his mouth against the corner of her lips.
“No. No,” she insisted, and tried to slide her mouth under his, but he avoided the attempt.
“Tonight, Lorna,” he murmured against her throat, “I’m going to make you want me so much that you’ll never look at any other man as long as you live.”
“I don’t want anyone else,” she whispered.
Her hips moved against him in a silent urging. It seemed he was listening as he shifted to remove his pants with one hand but he wouldn’t release her arms. Her skin flamed with the heat of his body when she felt the nakedness of his muscled legs. She arched willingly against him, but he continued to resist giving her the satisfaction her body craved.
With his hands and his mouth, he explored every inch of her from fingers to toes, stroking and nibbling until there wasn’t a part of her that didn’t tingle. When he finally mounted her, it was a mating of the mind, the flesh, and the soul. There was a purity to it that brought tears to her eyes and an eroticism that left her limp.
27
Tell me now”—Benteen tightened the arm encircling her waist—”that you can leave me and run away with Bull Giles.”
“I couldn’t do it before, and I certainly couldn’t do it now,” she admitted, and let her hands play over his chest, now that she was finally allowed to touch him.
“But he’s suggested it.”
“Yes, but that’s only because of you—because he thought you were hurting me.” Lorna shifted in his hold so she could see his face.
“Hurting you?” Benteen frowned. “What gave him that idea?”
“The way you and Lady Crawford behave together. I saw it for myself today.” There was a trace of accusation in her voice—but only a trace. It was difficult to believe he could be having an affair with another woman after the way he’d just made love to her. Yet there was still the evidence of her own eyes.
“Saw what?” There was a narrowing of his gaze.
“The way she touched you. It wasn’t any different than the way Bull touched my face,” Lorna said.
