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“You do not know me, Maggie.”
Her head fell back to his collarbone as his dangerous hand moved down, raking the soap-slicked, rough rag over her full breasts and belly. Her breasts felt heavy, laden, her nipples hard, almost painful, nubs. He skimmed them, soft as anything, then abraded them roughly. Her breath stopped as her head fell forward, so close to climax one more touch would do the deed.
“I do know you, Tadhg,” she whispered. “Better than you know yourself.”
She turned her head, looked over her shoulder so their eyes met.
“I see who you are. You see only who you fear you might become.”
Those dark eyes locked on hers, then his hands gripped her roughly and he spun her around, pulled her wet and slippery body up against his, so her breasts smashed against his tunic.
“I have used you from the moment I met you.” It was almost a snarl as he thrust his hands up into her damp hair. “From the beginning you have been nothing but a means to an end. I tore you from safety, ripped you from your home and livelihood, took you into cold and ruin, destroyed all that was good in your life. You are a fool to trust me.”
He curled his fingers around her jaw and tipped her face up farther, farther, then brought his mouth to hover an inch above hers. It was the closest a kiss could be to a threat.
“Name one deed I have done that would make a sane person trust me,” he growled.
She stared into the dark eyes so close to hers, so filled with pain and checked fury.
“You came back for me,” she said simply.
His eyes widened, then he gave a bark of harsh laughter. “Came back for you? That is how you measure my gift? My one good deed, to bring you deeper into this? Christ blood, Maggie, do you still not see the truth?” He sounded truly pained. “I came back because I am a selfish bastard. I have always been.” His hands tightened. “I left everyone, everything, when it did not serve me and what I wanted.”
“You did not leave me.” She slid her arms around his shoulders, pressing her wet, naked body up against the hard mail and fury of him. “You came back because you are a good man. You have the heart of a lion, Tadhg.” She tapped his chest. “Not your king, you. Tadhg, coeur de lion. That is why I love you.”
He made a hoarse, strangled sound, half curse, half cry, clamped his hands around her waist, and kissed her like a dying man.
For that is what he was. He’d been dying his whole life, dying and dirty, and Maggie was bringing him back to life again.
He sank into her mouth, and her tongue met his, plunge for reckless, greedy plunge. “I am sorry.” He growled as he dragged his lips down the line of her arched neck. “So sorry.” He cupped her head, kissed her cheeks. “I could still get you home again. You could have your life back.”
Her lips swept across his. “I do not want my life back.”
He dipped his head, put his face in the crook of her warm neck and whispered, “Och, lass, I do not know what the future holds.” He felt ruined, unable to give her even the promise of a tomorrow.
She cupped his face the way he was holding hers and made him look up.
“Tadhg, hear me: I have been dying slowly for half my life. I would have died a little more every day for the rest of it too. Twenty, thirty years or more of a slow, unnoticeable death. If I am fully alive for half that with you, or less than half—” she added when he shifted impatiently “—be it a day, fully alive, with you, then that is what I choose. ’Tis better than withering away through a long stretch of days without you, no matter how safe they may be.”
His warrior’s face slipped, just for a moment, all that was hard in him shifted, and he leaned his head to hers, and said in a guttural, broken whisper, “I love you.”
She was crying, because he was inside her now, she could feel it. His hands and mouth and breath were just the shape of him, but the essence of him, his true spirit, the thing that made him man, made him Tadhg, was inside her now.
Even so, she wanted the shape of him, the hard power of him, inside her too. His thick shaft, taking her, that brash male confidence that would come and claim her, make her shake with a desire so potent it left her breathless.
Her legs were already opening for him, and they still stood upright. Her knee lifted to hook around his hip. His hot hand scooped beneath her bottom and helped her up, lifted her to him, their mouths still locked in swooping, messy, hot wet kisses. Half missed their mark, landed on cheek or ear.
Still half-clinging to his hips, she began tugging on his clothes. He joined her, more mad struggles of hand and cloth, as it had been in the hut, as it had been the first time, in her shop, when they had not even bothered to disrobe, for this is how their passion had been ordained: madly, fervently, passionately.
Within moments he had her on the bed, her legs spread, and he was kneeling between them. There was no hesitation, this was no slow taking, it was possession, and eyes locked, he breeched her in a single, hard plunge.
She flung her head on the furs and sobbed from the pleasure.
He interlaced their fingers and stretched her arms out above her head, until she was stretched on the rack of his pleasure. He leaned
down on their entwined hands, pressing into them on every long, slow thrust as he entered her deeply.
She lifted her hips, meeting every penetration, never looking away as he took her hard, their hips rocking in a hard, striking, relentless rhythm, dragging hot cords of excitement across her body. He freed one of his hands and took her knee, held it to his hip and forced her to spread wider for him, his possession intensifying. Propped on one hand, their gazes locked, he took her harder, and harder yet, until she bounced on the bed, her head pressed back, her neck in a hard arch, her hips always lifting to him.
