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He took the clay pot from her and dipped the tip of his finger in it. Her breath caught as he painted a spot on her neck with it. His mouth followed, and her lips dropped open as he kissed the jam off her neck, continuing over to her ear.
“I will never be able to sample strawberry again without growing hard and ready,” he whispered.
Her hands went up to capture his head, bringing his lips to hers. She tasted the jam on his tongue and slanted against him, her hands seeking out the muscles of his chest. She yanked up his tunic, her fingers sliding up his smooth skin, through the light curls of hair, over the chiseled contours. His heat drew her completely.
He pulled his tunic off, a white ghost going over his head to drop on the stone floor. His mouth dropped to the skin between her neck and shoulder, trailing along it. Lucy felt the heavy table at her back and leaned backwards onto her hands, tipping her head back to give Greer as much access as he wanted to her skin. With a grasp around her waist, he lifted her to sit on the table, her skirts around her.
Lucy kissed him with abandon, her one hand rucking up her skirts. She spread her legs, raising them to encircle his hips. She wiggled her shoulders, tugging on her body, to slip her bodice far enough down that her breasts rolled out of the top. Greer looked down at them, sitting pale in the dim light.
He growled and descended, his mouth encircling her nipple as he palmed the other. Lucy moaned softly, her foot stroking his arse. Gently he leaned her back. She heard the scrape of the strawberry jar and then his finger touching the inside of her thighs.
He inhaled. “I love the smell of strawberry.” His head ducked down where her skirts were bunched.
Lucy gasped as he licked her inner thigh, kissing the tender flesh there and working higher. She’d heard whispers of women being loved so. “Oh Greer,” she said, breathless as he touched her very core, loving her so thoroughly that her hands clenched in her skirts. Her eyes were closed but she could imagine him below. The images and sounds made her coil tighter until she shattered, groaning.
As the waves carried her, he pulled her forward, her legs spread still around his waist. He slowly impaled her. Her whole body shook as he filled her, and she clung to him, half on and half off the table. They rocked together, moving faster, the table creaking. His mouth moved between her breasts, her neck, and her lips without breaking contact. Lucy kissed him wildly, frantically. Over and over, they rocked together, climbing higher for long, exquisite minutes, the table taking the force of Greer’s thrusts. Lucy clutched hold of him as her pleasure swelled once again, and when he reached between them, rubbing her, she burst.
He followed swiftly, his groan muffled against her mouth.
“Yes, Greer, yes.”
*
“I am stickyall over,” Lucy said, laughing lightly.
Greer watched her tug up her bodice, once again hiding her breasts. “Jam is now my favorite food.”
She smiled brightly. “I knew you would like my jam.”
He almost threw her skirts back over her head. His grin felt natural and genuine. No woman had ever robbed him of his focus like Lucy Cranfield, but no woman had ever made him smile.
Bloody hell. He was on a mission from Lord Moray, and yet here he was in a kitchen larder licking and loving jam off a woman. And he didn’t feel guilty. His mission had become less about saving the queen of England and more about seeing Lucy Cranfield’s scars and proving to her that she was indeed beautiful.
“I would like to make ye moan in the light,” he said, pulling her to him and kissing her softly. “Where I can kiss every inch of ye.”
Her smile wavered. “We have proven that we can have great pleasure with our clothes still on.”
He kissed her neck under her ear and whispered. “Oh, but ye have not experienced inch by inch kisses and nibbles.”
A sound in the kitchen made their heads turn in unison toward the storeroom door. “No one should be about this late. And ’tis too early for the morning cooks,” Lucy whispered and pulled away from him. He felt the absence immediately.
Lucy tugged the door open an inch. Greer stood behind her, watching through the crack. A woman stood at the counter, her back to them. Was this the assassin? A woman sent to poison something that only the queen would eat? Or would she kill more in her attempt?
They let her work for a few minutes. He would catch her in the act so she could not deny her evil intentions.
The woman turned toward their hiding space as if she’d heard them, and he found himself holding his breath. It was the Irish kitchen maid; O’Brien was her last name. Her brows were furrowed as she stepped directly toward them.
With a yank, she pulled the door open. “I’ve got you,” she said.
Chapter Fifteen
“On the daie of the Epiphanie at night, the kyng with a. xi. other were disguised, after the maner of Italie, called a maske, a thyng not seen afore in Englande, thei were appareled in garmentes long and brode, wrought all with gold, with visers and cappes of gold & after the banket doen, these Maskers came in, with sixe gentlemen disguised in silke bearyng staffe torches, and desired the ladies todaunce…[sic]”
Chronicler Edward Hall, Epiphany in 1512, Henry VIII’s reign
Mary O’Brien lookedfirst at Lucy and then Greer. “Actually, Goodwife O’Brien,” Lucy said, “we’ve caught you.”
Her surprise at seeing them, with Lucy looking quite ravished, turned to confusion. “Caught me? What do you mean? And what are you doing hiding in the larder?”
