“You speak as though you know from experience.”
“My older brother watches over us.He was sickly from birth and grew up feeble.Though his body was weak, his spirit was strong.He suffered for years before he left this realm.My mother was devastated, and nothing Omira or I did could soothe her.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.I had seen plenty of mothers devastated by the loss of children, but it seemed strange to me that a child born sickly had been allowed to live.In Earsleh any child who was not strong and healthy at birth was put in the sea.We could not waste resources on anyone not able to defend the country.
“He is still remembered, but the pain has passed.In time, your pain will pass too.”
“I know, but right now—” My voice hitched as I tried to take a breath.“Right now, it hurts so very much.”
“What can I do?”
I shook my head and almost saidnothing.Nothing more than he could have done for his mother.Instead, I said, “Hold me.”
His arms closed around me, and I was cradled against his solid chest.My ear pressed against his heart, the steady sound of it beating comforted me.I wouldn’t cry.I’d cried enough, and tears would do nothing to bring Finnrey back.So I blinked the tears away, and took a deep breath.Immediately, my senses were aware of the scent of Taio.I caught the aroma of pine that clung to him and all of us from being in the forest.Underneath that was a lighter scent of lemon.The lemon must have been from the soap he’d used when he’d bathed in the pool.And then there was the scent of him under the lemon.That was his scent—Taio’sscent.I buried my face deeper in his chest to be closer to that scent, to attempt to decipher it.Something masculine and slightly musky.He smelled of the exotic as well—at least exotic to me.I caught the faint aroma of spices, but not any I recognized.Perhaps spices native to Zulen...
I untucked my hand and ran it across his ribs and to his back.Slowly, I slid my hand up the muscled ridges I could feel under his shirt.I waited for him to chide me or tell me to stop.Instead, I heard the way his heart pounded faster.I grew bolder, my hand exploring the hard planes of his upper back then skating over his shoulder and down his chest to where his heart thumped quite rapidly now.I pulled back and looked up at him, my hand on his heart.
“You like it when I touch you,” I said, feeling his heart thudding under my hand.My own heart was thundering now too, my body too warm and beginning to tingle.
“I do,” he said, his voice little more than a rumble.
My hand slid lower to his abdomen, and he released a measured breath.My hand moved lower, and he inhaled, his breath hitching as my fingers grazed the waistband of his trousers.“You are very controlled,” I murmured.
He let out a small laugh.“If you knew the thoughts in my head right now, you would not think I had any control,mi guerrira.”
“Oh?What thoughts are those?”I let my hand dip lower, feeling his male member through the fabric of his trousers.He was hard and thick, and heat radiated even through the fabric.
“If I tell you, I’ll scare you away.”
“I doubt that.”I unfastened a button at the waist of his trousers, and his hand caught my wrist.
“I am supposed to be comforting you.”
“I’m quite comfortable,” I said.His brow furrowed at my play on words, reminding me he was still a novice at our language.I swallowed.“I just want to forget for a little while, Taio.”
He made a sound of understanding.“I told you in the arena that we have a saying in Zulen.Ladies first.”
“And I said that was quaint.”
“It is anything but quaint in bed.”
I stilled, my mouth going dry.
“We believe a woman’s pleasure comes first.If you will allow me, I can give you comfort of another sort.”
I opened my mouth to say...I didn’t know what to say.Perhaps that we were not alone, and we couldn’t be certain anyone else was sleeping.Then he raised himself up on his elbows and brushed his lips over mine.After that, I couldn’t think at all.My arms went around his neck, and I pulled him over me, letting him claim my mouth with those skilled lips of his.When he teased my lips open and touched his tongue tentatively to mine, I had to stifle a moan.I followed his lead, pursuing his tongue back and tracing his lips with the tip of my tongue.
His hand rested on my neck, at my rapidly beating pulse, but now he moved his palm down over my chest and on top of my heart.He said something in his language, and then his hand moved to the side, cupping my breast in his warm palm.He caught my moan with his mouth, tangling his tongue with mine as he teased my hardening nipple with his fingers.
Underneath him, I began to squirm as his mouth took mine and his hand woke sensations in my body I hadn’t felt before.I pressed my legs together to try and quell the throbbing between them.I ached to be touched there.
Taio’s mouth left mine and trailed to my neck where he pressed light kisses up to my ear then bit the lobe gently.I caught my lower lip between my teeth to keep quiet, even as I shivered from the feel of his breath whispering across my sensitive skin.His mouth moved lower, and his hand left my breast and caressed a path to my abdomen.His mouth replaced his hand, taking my nipple between his teeth through the fabric of my tunic.Gods but I wanted that mouth on my bare flesh.I wanted the fingers on my belly to touch my skin.
“Touch me,” I whispered.“My skin.”I wasn’t certain I made any sense, but he seemed to understand.He rucked up my tunic and placed a hand on my belly.His flesh was warm and rough and his hand large enough that it all but covered my stomach.He didn’t linger there.His fingers dipped into the waist of my leggings and then down where I was aching for him.
I should have stopped him.Even under our bedrolls and with the coat over us, the others were just a few yards away.But I didn’t care about them.All I cared about was the feel of his fingers as they feathered through my damp curls to find the place where I needed him.One finger brushed over that sensitive part of me, and I bucked.
“There?”He murmured against my breast.
