Pharis laughed. “I don’t just mean saving my life. I mean the way you took care of me afterward. I was insensible half the time, but the other half I was aware. Every time I woke, you were there, day and night. I wonder if you even slept.”
He dropped the lock of hair and raised his hand to cup my face, sweeping his thumb gently under my eye, probably tracing a lovely dark circle.
“I did,” I said, fighting to recover the breath he’d stolen. “A little.”
I’d sent the girls to sleep in the tent with Papa, staying up most of the night, keeping watch with Pharis’ dagger in hand, then passing out next to him during the day whenever he slept.
“Tired girl,” he said softly.
His hand moved from my cheek to brush my hair back then delved beneath it to find the tight muscles at the back of my neck.
Very slowly, he massaged them, and I thought I might melt right there from the sheer bliss of it.
My eyelids must have closed because they flew open when he spoke again.
“Feel good?” he asked.
“Hmmmmm,” was all the response I could muster, and Pharis chuckled.
“You’re strung as tight as my bow,” he said. “Lie down.”
“What? I’m fine. I’m not sleepy.”
“I’m not asking you to sleep,” he said with overdone patience in his voice. “Just lie down next to me here. On your belly.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked in a shrill tone that made him laugh.
“Relax, Wildcat, your virtue is safe. If I’ve managed to resist you this far…”
He didn’t finish the tantalizing sentence, leaving me to fill in the rest.
Wait—resist me?
Before I could restart my brain to think properly again, Pharis pulled my supporting arm away and eased me down to the cloak, rolling me onto my front until I was lying face-down.
And then his big hands were on my back, kneading the tense muscles and sending waves of pleasure radiating all over my body. I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from releasing a moan and embarrassing myself or piquing the girls’ curiosity.
I hoped they stayed in the tent with Papa a long, long time.
My head was turned to one side, and Pharis must have been amused by my expression. There was a laugh in his voice when he said, “You’d think you never had a massage before.”
“Is that what this is?” I said in a husky voice I’d never in my life heard come from my own mouth.
“It is,” his voice rumbled. “And you’ve never had one apparently. You’ve been living a life of terrible deprivation, little Wyn.”
All I could do was mumble the word “yes,” as his strong hands continued their work, moving to the left arm and hand, which were nearest him.
My right arm was fairly screaming in envy, eager for its turn, and my legs were starting to get restless.
Would he touch them too?
No doubt that would be highly inappropriate, but with pleasure signals racing from one end of my body to the other, I could not make myself care about propriety right now.
After satisfying the demands of my right upper limb, Pharis did slide down on the cloak and begin to rub my leg through my skirt.
Oh yes.
There was only one problem. My skin felt literally thirsty for his touch, demanding I remove the offending fabric between us so I could feel his hands with no impediment.
