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His kiss wasn’t meant to be gentle. It was meant to consume. To claim.

She whimpered, water splashing all around them, as his hands cupped her. First, her breasts. And then gliding down to her waist, over her hips. Unashamedly exploring, as she did him. Groaning under the touch of her fingertips on his arms, feeling the muscles there, Galien dropped his hands well beneath the water.

Cupping her. And then slipping inside with the promise of what was to come.

“Are you cold still?” he asked, pleasantly breathless.

“I don’t remember,” she said, her words making little sense, but the feel of her making more of it than anything that had come before her. It all felt so perfect, the agonizing he’d spent over his role in Wallace’s camp, and his love for Reina, so far removed from them it could have happened years ago.

He may have been cold at first, but with Reina in his arms, Galien was well prepared for this moment he’d dreamed of. Imagined. Wished for. He stood on the river’s bed, positioned himself to slip inside her, and held his wife’s gaze. “It will hurt for but a moment, I am told.”

Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, Reina’s gaze held his. “I am more than ready,” she assured him. “Please, Galien. . .”

He entered her, and then stopped. Her eyes emboldened him to continue. Lifting her, wrapping his wife’s legs around his waist, he braced her.

And himself.

With one thrust, Reina was no longer a virgin. And she was, for this day and forever, his. Wishing to take away the pain in her expression, Galien kissed her. Gently at first. But then as she began to move against him, he drew her in. Deeper and deeper. Their kiss mimicked their movements below the water.

Effortlessly he held her against him, the feel of being joined as such with Reina unlike anything he’d ever experienced before. She had rescued him. Saved his life. And now was his. Galien would spend the remainder of his days thanking her, loving her.

And he would start this very moment.

Circling his hips, Galien pressed into his wife in a way that made her whimper.

Not enough.

He cupped her backside and squeezed. She groaned against his lips.

Not enough.

He reached down in between them, thanking the river for holding her up as he rubbed her with his thumb. When she whimpered, Galien knew she was close.

But still, not enough.

With his tongue, he showed his wife what was to come next. Pressing, and withdrawing. Swirling as he thrust into her harder each time, hoping he did not push too far for her first time. But as her buttocks squeezed, he withdrew his hand, slamming into her and leaving no doubt she was utterly, completely his.

And Galien was hers. He knew it as she broke from him, screaming his name as he roared hers. With only the woods as their witness, Galien and Reina become husband and wife in truth. His body shook with the impact of it. Holding her as tightly to him as possible, he poured himself into her.

A fitting end to a most unconventional courtship.

When their breathing both finally slowed, Galien continued to hold his wife to him. Wet, likely moments away from a chill, and happier than he’d ever been in all his days, he smiled at her. “I told you that your beautiful body,” his hands ran down her back, “was as sensitive as mine. And it seems, I was right.”

She struggled to remember. “Oh,” she said, awareness coming to her. “It was about to rain. And you could sense it.”

Galien kissed her nose. “Your face was covered with mud.”

“As was yours, if I will recall.”

“Indeed,” he said. “Even so, I imagined what it would be like to kiss you.”

She pressed her lips to his so Galien did not have to imagine. And then said, “Never did I dream that day I would become your wife. I’d only been looking for answers about my past. Not my future.”

Galien pulled himself from her, held onto his wife, and then stepped, carefully, from the river, carrying Reina to shore. “Ours is an uncertain one,” he said, finally allowing Reina down. Reaching to the ground, he lifted his plaid and covered her. “Our fight, I fear, has only just begun.”

“But it is ours,” she said, pulling him back to her. “We shall face it, together.”

“Aye, lass,” he agreed. “For better or worse, as Father Simon said. You are mine now.”