Anguish and tempest struck her anew. She could not surrender, not to his touch, not even to the ardent fever that swept about them both like a relentless tide. She had not seen him in so long. It had been more than two months. Two months in which she had done her best to be a Cameron wife, to cherish and nurture the land and the hall, to stand fast against any enemy. And then…
After everything, the British ships had appeared that morning and Robert had come to her bedchamber. And now everything that she had ever feared in Eric had been unleashed. He hated her with a passion, she could feel it in his touch each time his fingers brushed her or curled around her. His temper was on a taut string, barely held from total explosion.
But not even the bitter fire of his anger nor his absolute mockery could still the things he evoked in her when he came too close. Dear God! That she could go back to a time when she had despised him! But that time was gone. And now she longed to forget this day, this horrid, horrid day. She longed to embrace him. She hadn’t tasted in so long the sweetness and decadence of once-forbidden pleasures, felt his lips, his hands upon her. But she could not give to him now. Not when she knew so little of his mind, when his fury was so sharp, so blinding.
She parted her lips to speak, but she did not. She saw the wrath of his gaze and fell silent, unable to read his thoughts.
They were easy to fathom, he could have told her. But he hadn’t told her what others dreams had kept him awake at night. Dreams of her, as he saw her now. Her eyes so green, shadowed and shaded by the rich sweep of her lashes as they fell over the emerald orbs, fluttering open again. Even now her hair dried in tendrils both deep, dark sable and flaming red, depending how the locks curled or waved or lay upon her flesh.
He moved his hand to her cheeks, tracing the excellence of her features, the high set of her bones, the slight heart shape of the face, accented by the widow’s peak at her temple and the sweeping richness of her hair. Her lips were beautifully shaped, naturally rose, the lower lip full and the curve of the whole evocatively sensual. At rest she was exquisite, as a statue was exquisite. Her flesh was like marble in its perfection, from the slope of her shoulders and rise of her breasts to the shapely curves of her hips and calves. In motion she was more than beautiful, for she was energy and tension and passion, and her eyes were haunted with what emotion ruled her thoughts, always exciting, always eliciting his own passion, be it yearning need or a cyclone of fury.
And now…now her lips lay parted beneath his. Her breasts rose and fell with each whisper of her breath, and the length of her perfection lay beneath him. Theirs had never been a soft or quiet relationship, yet he had never thought it would come to this. He knew he would take her that night by any force, rather than see tomorrow come without the memory of the night.
His mouth came closer. Their eyes met at just a breath of space.
“No! We will not—do this!” Amanda managed to protest. “Not like this! Not when you do not love me!”
“Love, madame? When did that enter into your priorities? Certainly not when you married me. Not when you discovered maps within my library to give your father. Not when you betrayed this very house.”
“But I did not! Oh, Eric, you fool! Listen to me! Perhaps I am guilty of giving away past…secrets. You don’t understand! They held Damien—”
“What?” he demanded sharply.
She swallowed. “My father had Damien. He always threatened me with Damien. First he swore that he would have him arrested and hanged. And then he did have him, Eric. The horse! Remember at the governor’s palace on New Year’s? Damien’s horse died, and I knew that Father wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to a man. And then they actually held Damien! They were threatening me—”
“I see. But Damien has been freed for some time now, milady.”
“And that is what I am telling you! There is another spy out there, and it isn’t me!”
He smiled. “A pretty tale,” he told her.
“Eric, please—”
“Amanda, I do not please, milady! But before God, I swear it! I have missed you.”
“Oh!” she cried, then gasped and swore in fury, surging against him to escape him, feeling him ever more pressed against her body. Little was hid by the tightness of his breeches. Her eyes widened as she felt the strength of him. She shuddered violently, hating him and hating herself all the more because she did not care about pride or reason, only that he held her, even if it was all a lie.
“We cannot!”
“But you are my wife.”
“Who betrayed you, so you say.”
“It does not matter. Not now. Not tonight.”
“No! Eric!” She was very close to tears. “Not after today. My God, let me up!” She surged against him anew, trying to dislodge him, to free herself by any means. Darkness seemed to surround her in a rise of mist like the steam of a summer’s sun. She felt his hardness against her again, pulsing, vivid, and it seemed as if a thousand pagan drums began to beat within her heart and core and blood. She fought him, and she fought herself, but he held her firm, his eyes ever upon her until she blushed radiantly even as she choked and swore and struggled. “Eric! No!”
He smiled, and his gaze was taunting, provocative. “Ah…Mandy! Don’t you seek forgiveness?”
She went very still and moistened her lips.
“What?” She gasped.
“Perhaps I will.”
She watched him for a moment, but she didn’t trust him. He leaned against her, imprisoning her hands. “You cast yourself upon Tarryton, why not me? We even have the sanctity of marriage upon us, my love.”
“I never cast myself upon Tarryton!” she swore. She tried to kick him. He laughed, for his weight was well upon her, and he was in no danger. Fury filled her. “You want me to beg your forgiveness in this manner!”
