“No! Do not touch me.” This time, Searle’s words were clear, unmistakable as his voice. “Ne pas.Ne pas!”
He began thrashing then, his breathing deep and harsh. Another strangled cry emerged from his throat.
Dear God, the marquess must be suffering from a nightmare. And if he was speaking in French, it was a possibility his mind had returned him to the source of his torment. That he believed himself once more in Spain, the captive of Boney’s forces.
The urge to calm and console him was instant and instinctive.
“Searle.” Tentatively, she reached in the direction of his voice. Her hand met with cold, clammy flesh that trembled beneath her touch.
And then a hand clasped around her wrist in a manacle grip, and she was propelled onto her back, trapped beneath a heavy, strong body. Powerful thighs trapped her hips, pinning her to the bed, and he did the same with her wrists, clasping both and holding them over her head. His chest pressed against her naked breasts with thinly veiled force.
His breathing was even more ragged and desperate, hot on her face and neck. Something cold and wet dripped upon her cheek, and she wondered if it was somehow, impossibly, a tear. And then, at his mercy, something else occurred to her. Something horrible.
It was possible he was out of his mind. Possible he would hurt her.
“Morgan.” His name was torn from her, all she could manage in her sudden fear. “Morgan, it is Leonora.”
“Leonora,” he exhaled her name, as if it were a prayer. A shudder ripped through him, and she felt it from her thighs to her breast. “Leonora?”
“Yes.” How she wished she could touch him. Comfort him. Caress him. But he had not released her wrists. “It is me, my lord. You were having a nightmare, I fear. Will you not release me, if you please?”
“Jesus.” He released her instantly, his voice laden with remorse. His forehead tipped to hers, resting there, his breath fanning hotly over her lips as he seemed to struggle to regain his composure. “I am so sorry. Have I hurt you, Leonora?”
He had momentarily stolen the breath from her, and her wrists smarted from the force of his grip, but she was more concerned with his wellbeing than her own. Freed, her hands found their way to his bare back. Tentatively, gently, as if he were a beast, she could not be certain would bite, she caressed him, her fingers finding the ridges of his scars mingling with the smooth, velvet heat of his unmarked flesh.
“You did not hurt me, Morgan,” she assured him softly, his name feeling right on her tongue for the first time.
Even after the shocking intimacies they had shared when he had made love to her, calling him thus had felt foreign and wrong. But he seemed more reachable to her now, in this rare moment of vulnerability, than he had ever been before. Here was her first glimpse of his humanity, of the suffering dwelling within him that no doubt caused the cold aloofness he showed the world and herself most of the time.
“Damn it to hell, I did not intend to fall asleep,” he gritted, attempting to move away from her.
But when he would have gone, she held him still, trapping him with her body. She wrapped her legs around his lean hips, crushing him tightly in her arms. “Do not move away from me. Please, let me give you comfort.”
He stiffened, and it was as if he had turned to stone. She could not be certain which version of the Marquess of Searle frightened her more, the battle-weary soldier defending himself in his slumber or the icy-cold stranger she had wed. Hours earlier, when he had been kissing her, when he had been inside her body, he had been someone else still, and now she feared she would never reclaim that man. The man who had kissed her as if her lips were the most decadent sweet he had ever tasted. The man who had made her experience such glorious rushes of pleasure, the likes of which she had never imagined possible.
“I do not need your comfort, madam,” he all but spat, his head jerking up, severing the connection between them but not tearing away from her entirely.
Not yet.
“I think you are wrong,” she told him boldly. “I think you do, Searle. I think you need me very much.”
“This.” His hand cupped the space between her legs. “I need your cunny, wife. Do not delude yourself that I need anything more from you.”
His words hurt more than his manhandling of her had, but she knew they emerged as a defense. The Marquess of Searle may be her husband of only one week, but it had not taken her long to discover he was a proud man. He never showed a hint of either weakness or tender emotion, and she did not fool herself it was because he was incapable. Rather, he did notwishto show anyone else his true defenselessness. He had been a prisoner, after all, and he would have been at the mercy of his captors.
“Then take comfort in me as you must,” she told him through the darkness, still tenderly stroking his back and all the puckered evidence of how very helpless he had once been. Her heart ached for the wounded warrior within him, the man whose outer scars had healed but who bore far more painful inner wounds that continued to ruin him.
“This is not comfort,” he growled, his fingers delving deeper into her, finding the bud of flesh that even now, longed for his touch. “This is fucking, Leonora. I do not require your pity or your softness or your gentle bloody touches after I have nearly broken you in two with my own bare hands. Do you understand?”
Yes, she understood. She understood him better now than she had ever before. He was ashamed of himself, frightened he had hurt her, or that hewouldhurt her, terrified of his own weakness. But she could not help but to feel she was meant to be his second chance. Filled with a boldness she could scarcely credit as her own, she slid her hands from his back to his neck and then higher still, her fingers sinking into his thick, silken hair.
She cupped his head, wondering at what mayhem could possibly be rioting within his mind, trapped inside the lean, angry elegance of this beautiful stranger she had wed. “I am yours, Searle,” she whispered into the inky silence curtaining them.
It was as if they were the only two people who existed in the world. There was nothing but the demons of his past and the rawness of their bare, imperfect bodies pressed together. There was nothing but untamed desire and the raging need to be one. If she could heal him, if she could offer up herself as sacrifice, she gladly would. And she would enjoy it, for he set her aflame with the wanton fires of the wicked, and she wanted nothing more than to scorch in them.
“Yes,” he growled, his chest pressed so tightly to her breasts she felt the vibration of it. “You are mine, aren’t you? What a curious thing you are, urging me to bed you after I have just taken your maidenhead and then hurt you.”
Self-derision underscored his every word.
