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When she placed her soft hand on his thigh, tentatively rubbing the liniment into his skin, Royal swallowed a groan. He squeezed his eyelids together to shut out the sight of what she was doing to him. Hewouldcontrol himself. He’d die rather than frighten her, even though he all but shook with the need to drag her up to his mouth for a devouring kiss.
Thankfully, the burgeoning pain as she massaged the tight thigh muscles did enforce a necessary discipline. Sweat prickled along his hairline as she worked to ease the spasm.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He gave a terse nod without opening his eyes.
For the next few minutes, he was caught between heaven and hell. As the liniment heated under her surprisingly assured touch, odors of cloves and menthol teased his nostrils, and his skin began to tingle with the familiar warmth of Brody’s potion. As she worked his thigh with increasingly firm strokes, the spasm finally began to ease, and he relaxed into the pillows.
“Better?” she quietly asked. “Shall I continue?”
He dragged open his eyelids. She regarded him earnestly, her complexion flushed from her efforts. The light from the bedside table cast a warm glow on her creamy breasts. Kneeling as she was and leaning slightly forward, her position allowed him to see straight down to the shadowy edge of her nipples, a dusky tease that he felt deep in his groin.
She was so lovely it all but stopped his heart.
“You don’t have to,” he gritted out.
Her tiny snort was both feminine and knowing. “Close your eyes, Royal. Just relax.”
Heshouldtell her to go, especially for her sake. But when she started up again, her long, sensual strokes pulled a moan from his lips even as his eyelids shuttered once more.
With every touch of her fingers, desire added fuel to the fire in his belly. Her touch soothed yet tortured, one moment lulling him to sleep, the next stoking his lust. It was the most delicious, frustrating experience of his entire life, and all she was doing was massaging his damn leg.
The leg that had not felt so good in a very long time. His wife was a bloody miracle worker.
When her hand suddenly slipped down to the inside of his thigh, tantalizing close to his straining cock, his eyes shot open.
“Ainsley, what the hell are you doing?”
Their gazes locked. Royal suspected his eyes were bugging out of his skull, but hers had turned a dark, velvety blue, slumberous and enticing.
“I’m touching you,” she said, rather breathless. “And I think I’m going to kiss you, too.”
Too stunned to respond, he simply stared at his beautiful wife as she planted her hands on his shoulders and proceeded to do just that.
* * *
Royal’s brawny shoulders stiffened under her fingertips as she pressed a trembling kiss to his lips. She caught the faint tang of whisky and felt the stern set to his wonderful mouth. When that mouth held its unwavering line, Ainsley’s heart pounded like Thor’s hammer.
Had she misread him?
His body’s reaction, barely concealed by the sheets, suggested she hadn’t. But what did she truly know about a man’s wants and needs? Perhaps it was an unexpected physical reaction he couldn’t control. Perhaps he was just as stunned by what was happening between them as she was.
Or her bizarre timing could be putting him off. She was supposed to be nursing the poor man, not seducing him. Given his level of pain, it was a miracle he could even have a sensible conversation, much less return her clumsy advances.
But with her husband stretched out under her hands, all her difficult, surging emotions had crested into an irresistible tide. Feeling that tough, masculine body respond to her touch, hearing the deep groan rumble quietly in his throat, she’d simply given in to the impulse she’d been fighting for so long.
Tentatively, she kissed first one corner of his mouth and then the other. Still, though, he refused to yield, stiff as a plank of oak beneath her. She obviouslyhadmade a mistake and had no idea how to get out of it other than to slink from the bed and scurry to her bedroom as fast as her weak knees could carry her.
Squeezing her eyes shut against a rush of shame, she started to retreat but didn’t get very far. Royal’s hand shot up to wrap around her neck, keeping her face only inches away from his. She reluctantly opened her eyes, fearing disapproval in his gaze.
His cheekbones were glazed with a dark flush, and his pupils were huge, making his eyes look more black than green.
“Sweetheart, exactly what is happening here?” he asked in a low, rough voice.
His breath, warm and whisky-scented, brushed her cheek with an invisible caress.
“I . . . I’m kissing you,” she stammered. “Is that all right?”
