Sahar dismounted from Lasair and stretchedher legs and back as the sun dipped low in the sky turning it adusky gray.They’d made good time despite their late start thatmorning, after she’d told Aleksi to go fuck himself.It was aNorthern seaman’s swear word that she’d heard her grandfather usewhen he was spitting mad, which was what she’d been this morning.It was also a swear word her mother would cuff her for using if sheever got wind of it, but the release Sahar felt when hurling it atthat cocksure ass would still have been worth her mother’scensure.
Aleksi hadn’t known the exact meaning of theword, but he knew exactly what she’d meant by it.He hadn’t cursedor shouted back at her, but had gone as stiff and silent as stone,and had remained that way throughout the day’s journey.
For the best, really.As she led Lasair tothe stream, she couldn’t think of what they’d have to say to eachother that had not already been said.That they were drawn to eachother physically had been apparent from the start.Equally apparentwas their penchant for needling and challenging each other to thepoint of constantly arguing.
That she had been the one to push them tohave sex was on her.She could easily try to blame it on hisconstant, not-so-subtle pressure, or on the trauma the Wolf and hiscurs had put her through, but she knew it was her doing.As much ofa strutting stallion as he was, he would’ve never forced himself onher.He would’ve continued to behave in a princely manner.She hadacted more like a wanton harlot than a virginal princess, areckless, foolish strumpet who hadn’t taken any precautions againstbecoming pregnant until this morning, and even then, it had beenAleksi who had shown common sense and restraint, not her.
Which made her what?
One of a world full of women trapped by thelaws of nature and the social mores of men.
Not that she disagreed with the tradition ofmarriage when children were involved.From what she had seen,children always did better with a mother and a father raising them,as long as both parents were good, decent people.As angry as shewas with him, she couldn’t deny he was good and decent.Or that hisexperience growing up the bastard son of a king had given him aunique perspective.
The first day they met, he’d told her hewanted a wife of sturdy body and easy temper who could bear himsons, and she understood his unwillingness to knowingly bring abastard into this world.She may never have been a woman of easytemper, and her bruised, half-starved body was far from sturdythese days, but she didn’t understand why it hurt so much knowinghe no longer wanted her to be his wife and the mother of hischildren.Especially when she swore she didn’t wish to beeither.
Lasair nosed Sahar’s shoulder, nudging herback to the here and now, and she walked her horse over to whereAleksi had strung a rope and tied off the mare between Zolotoy andthe two geldings that had belonged to the Jackal and the Tall.Sheleft them to graze as she started to pull supplies from the saddlebags for the night.
“We need to build a lean-to.”
Those were the first words Aleksi had spokento her since that morning.“What?”
“Rain is coming.”He pointed up to thegathering clouds in the darkening sky.“We need to build a lean-tofor shelter.”
He looked around and walked over to a spotunder two trees with thick canopies that wove together overhead.“We’ll build it here.”He handed her his short sword.“Cut at leastten and two leafy branches yea by yea big”—he indicated with hisarms out—“for the roof, while I find some base poles.”
Whacking small branches from trees and pilingthem next to the frame he was building turned out to be exactly therelease she needed.By the time the lean-to was complete and he’dmoved the horses and tied them off under the tree’s canopy, hermuscles were warm and her head clear of the thoughts that had beenswirling round and round without end.
She laid out their bedrolls inside the snugden, one on top of the other.There was no room to lay them side byside.She tossed the dried meat and dates from the Wolf’s storethat would pass as their supper onto the middle of the makeshiftbed, trying not to think about what would happen when they lay downtogether for the night.
It would likely be their last night alonebefore the search party her father would have sent found them.Their last night to be free of the princess and the bastard, to beonly Aleksi and Sahar, stallion and tigress.Despite everythingthat’d happened, everything they’d said and done, everything theywere and weren’t to each other, all she wanted this night was toburn with him, to raze him to scorched earth and have him riseagain.
Aleksi sat cross legged on the bedrolls andpicked at the pile of dates and dried meat, resigned to a coldsupper and a cold bed as the first fat drops of rain splatted onthe ground beyond the trees’ shelter.If it had not been for thethreatening rain, he would’ve gladly slept in his own bedroll onthe opposite side of the camp.
He finished his meager, tasteless supper andstepped behind the lean-to and relieved himself.The trees’ canopystill held off the rain for now, and as long as the rain didn’tbecome a deluge, their little lean-to should keep them dry.Hechecked on the horses one more time, delaying his return to theclose confines of the lean-to and whatever creature resided thereat the moment: the cool, aloof she-cat, or the hissing, spittingtigress.
Sahar’s quicksilver moods usually intriguedand excited him, but tonight he wanted the quiet comfort of a goodsleep.With a resigned shrug he stooped and peeked inside.She wasalready under the covers, her tunic and breeches tucked under herhead like a pillow, her big, round, luminous cat eyes watching him,her luscious lips curled up in an inviting smile.
No.
He shook his head.If she thought he wasgoing to forget how angry he was and make love to her, she hadanother thing coming.He sat by her feet and pulled off his boots,and then his breeches, ignoring her throaty purr.Then he doffedhis leather outer tunic and his linen undertunic and folded them,and then set them down as a pillow.
He slid in behind her, skin to warm skin, andbit off a groan.Instead of reaching over and tucking her closer,he scooted back until there was nothing but air between them.Helaid his head down, willfully keeping his nose from the warm, sweetspot at her nape, though he could not keep from inhaling thewomanly scent of her.
No.
He flopped over to his other side so his backwas to her, still not touching her.If she didn’t want to bear hisbabe, then he would make certain she wouldn’t, and the only way todo that was to abstain from sex, no matter how much he craved her.Oh, he did.So much so that his hands twitched to reach out andtouch her smooth skin, to roam the taut muscles of her legs and theswells of her breasts and hips.He bit off another groan, hiscursed cock hard with the memory of nestling in her warm, wetfolds.
No.
He clamped his jaw tight and gritted histeeth and fisted his hands.He thought of her fisted hands as shestood in the river claiming she didn’t want to marry him or to bearhis child, and he jerked the covers up over his shoulders.Itwasn’t the first or only time since he’d known her that she’d saidshe did not wish to wed, and not only him but any man.Then why hadher refusal this morning hit him like a punch to the gut?
From the moment he had seen her sitting atthe royal table he’d known she wasn’t for him.A princess and abastard, even a king’s bastard, could have no future together.Itwasn’t either of their faults, it was the way of the world.Aleksihad told himself from the start that it didn’t matter.After theraces he would leave with his winnings and never see her again.
He didn’t want to care, but he did.She waslike no other woman he had ever been with.Not only beautiful andintelligent, but tactile and sensual, and as sure of her body asher mind.As fiery and adventurous in bed as out.Unlike the otherwomen he’d known, he would never forget a single thing about her.Not her spicy, exotic gardenia mixed with earthy, musky womanlyscent, or the feel of her skin against his, the pulse of her life’sblood coursing through her veins, her heart beating in time tohis.
All he had to do was close his eyes to seethe flashing green brilliance of hers, or lick his lips to tasteher salty sweetness.Then there was her voice, as deep and smoothas smoked honey.A voice that would tease and haunt his strainingears for the rest of his natural life, and likely beyond.He hadcome to care for her more than he had ever cared for any woman, andthat had been his mistake.The more you cared about someone, themore it hurt when they were taken away.This he knew from hardexperience.
No.
