Praise God, Jamie was back with her. This was all she needed.Hewas all she needed.
His hand moved up her thigh, and she could not breathe. She ached for him. Ached to have him touch her, to be inside her.
When he touched her center, she was wet with desire for him. She felt the warmth of his breath in her ear as he worked his magic with his fingers.
“Jamie…” She tried to speak, but could not. When she tugged at his shoulder, he understood and rolled on top of her.
At last she felt the tip of his shaft against her. She lifted her hips and gasped with the rush of sensation as he plunged into her. He paused when he was deep inside, and they clung together, both breathing hard. Then he rose on his elbows to look into her eyes. The warmth in them enveloped her and made her heart swell with joy.
“I love you,” he said. “I’ve never stopped.”
Her body clenched around his shaft inside her.
“I love you, too,” she said.
He began moving inside her, with excruciating slowness at first, and then with an urgency that matched her own. They were as one in their passion, their need, their love.
“I love you,” he said in a harsh gasp against her ear, and they came together in a pulsing release that staggered her with its violence.
Afterward, she lay adrift, resting in the circle of his strong arms. When at last she roused herself to lift her head and look at him, he gave her a wide grin.
“You did miss me, didn’t you?”
“Mmmm-hmmm.” She smiled and closed her eyes. “Perhaps you should bar the door. With so many guests in the castle, someone might wander in looking for an empty chamber.”
“You don’t fool me. You just want to look at my bare arse.”
It was true; she did enjoy the view when he went to bar the door. And when he turned around, he looked like a Greek god with the golden light of the brazier shining on the lines of hard muscles of his chest and arms. ’Twas a shame a man who looked like that ever had to wear a shirt.
She sighed with contentment as he lay down beside her and drew her into his arms again.
“ ’Tis good to have you back at Windsor, Jamie Rayburn.”
“So you did not fill your time with Edmund?” he asked, and she knew he was only half joking.
“You are the only man I want,” she said, pressing her face into his neck. “It’s been that way for me from the day you rode into Paris with the king.”
“You didn’t like me much before that, when we met in Caen,” he said with a smile in his voice.
“I was thirteen!”
“I remember you at thirteen,” he said, stroking her cheek. “You were so full of fire, and already so lovely, I am certain you attracted all manner of inappropriate attention.”
She had hated the way men leered at her.
Jamie brushed the hair back from her face and kissed her forehead. “I did not mean to make you frown.”
When she smiled up at him, he lowered his mouth to hers. She sighed with pleasure at the feel of him over her, his hard chest pressed against her breasts. As they kissed, she ran her hands over the long line of his back to the rise of his buttocks and back up again.
His body was more familiar to her than her own. Her fingers went to the scar where a blade had caught him in the side. Each of his battle scars, in an odd way, reassured her that Jamie could face whatever danger fate threw at him and survive. He was the very best of fighters.
After they made love again, she lay awake, waiting for him to renew his demand for pledges and promises. She would agree to what she must.
How much would she have to give up for him? How far would she have to go to keep him?
Jamie told himself he should take it one step at a time. She had told him she did not want him to leave her, ever. That should be enough for now. But it was not. He was done with pretense. He was finished with taking what he could get from her.
He should have pressed his advantage and insisted on an answer before he took her to bed. But seeing her vulnerable made him weak. When she said she missed him, he was ready to forgive her anything. Hearing her say she wanted him inside her sent lust roaring through him. Nothing mattered then except having her naked beneath him. His thoughts were drowned in sensation; making love to her was all he wanted, all he knew.
