The Warrior

For a moment Ranulf gathered her close and simply breathed in the fragrance of her hair, his fingers continuing their stroking. Presently, finally, he bent to catch the hem of her chemise and drew the garment over her head, leaving her completely naked.

He began touching her elsewhere then, everywhere, caressing her skin . . . the fine-boned curves and hollows of her face . . . the thickly beating pulse in her throat . . . the delicate lines of her body . . . the gently trembling limbs . . . rising again to her breasts.

Almost reverently Ranulf cupped the soft, graceful swells beneath his palms. They were high, firm, made as though to fit in a man’s hand. His fingers spread, fanning over her breasts in deepening strokes, his thumbs passing in scorching circles over her nipples.

Ariane lost pace with her breath. Blindly, her hands caught in Ranulf’s hair, pulling his head down to hers. “Kiss me . . . please,please . . . ”

He complied . . . but only for a tantalizing instant. His mouth brushed hers fleetingly, and then drew back . . . even as he skimmed his palm downward over her flat belly. His hand lightly cupped the rise of her silky curls, his sensitive fingers discovering the warmth below. Ariane moaned.

He barely touched her sex, barely brushed the moist flesh, and yet the effect was like a jolt of lightning, inciting a throbbing ache in her lower body, teasing the feverish flush of her skin. Her breathing deepened in quick and steady arousal, while her hips strained against his hand, seeking release from the fiery sensations streaking through her.

This time he allowed it when she dragged him back into the kiss, when she arched into him, her seeking mouth insistent and urgent. And yet he refused to give in to her demands. He maintained control, defining the pressure and rhythm.

His restraint was pure torment.

Her fingers clenched in Ranulf’s hair until finally he deepened the kiss with satisfying force. The sweetly probing eroticism of his tongue elicited small involuntary whimpers from her throat. His lips stroked against hers, drinking in her desperation, feeding the fire flowing between them. Ariane shuddered helplessly. His fingers were moving on her back, sending cascades of shivers through her.

“I crave you. . . .”

When he spoke the words against her lips, she answered him thickly, her head swimming. “Yes . . . yes . . .”

Her cheeks were hotly flushed, her knees weak. When he broke from her, she was trembling so badly that he had to support her with his hands.

With unhurried grace, Ranulf led her to the bed he had made with her mantle and settled himself there, then reached his hand up to her. Shaken by the pleasure-promise in his keen golden eyes, Ariane sank to her knees beside him.

Perhaps it was the breath of spring breeze that cooled her fevered skin, perhaps it was the bright look of male triumph in Ranulf’s eyes, but somehow she found the will to temper her desire, to control her fierce need.

Dragging in a shuddering breath, she pressed her palms against his naked chest, urging him backward, to lie on the mantle. She desperately wanted to plea

se him, wanted to give to him.

The scent of spring grass and wildflowers rose up to meet them; the wash of sunlight warmed their skin. Ranulf lay back unprotesting, letting his senses feast: the soft wool beneath his scarred back, the cool cascade of her hair as she bent over him, the warmth of her lips as she scattered hot, open kisses over his chest.

Shutting his eyes, Ranulf let his head fall back. In all his experience, he had never made love like this. He had taken wenches in the fields, a quick frenzied coupling, the rutting of animals. But never had he known anything like this . . . this sweetness and warmth, this gentleness. This aching need. This melding of desire between two people. The latent tenderness he felt was a bewildering, swelling pain within his chest.

Her hair tumbled forward to spill over him, and he clutched at it, his fingers twining in the silken tresses, as a drowning man clings to a solitary rock in the midst of a crashing sea.

Ariane felt his surrender, felt the hammering of his pulse beneath her lips as they pressed against a battle scar, felt the shudder that passed through him. The scent of his skin was intoxication, his heat a drugging lure.

Some ancient primitive force controlled her hands as she drew them over his beautiful body, feeling the hard lines of bone and muscle and taut sinew beneath her palms, caressing his burning skin. When she reached his groin, her fingers closed brazenly over his rigid member.

The thick length surged in her hand, hot and pulsing and iron hard.

Hardly daring to breathe, she bent closer and touched the thick column gently with her lips.

His chest muscles contracted harshly.

Her tongue gently flicked and circled the aching flesh.

His breathing sharpened.

At his helpless response, she became the aggressor, tasting, sampling, tormenting, using her lips and tongue eagerly, willingly. Reveling in the dark flush of passion on his harsh face, she sucked at him brazenly, first the huge swollen tip, then deeper, taking him slowly, fully in her mouth, driving him mad with need.

His chest rising harshly, Ranulf clenched his fists in the wool and arched his back, his hips straining helplessly against the velvet torment of her mouth, his blood pounding through his veins. In moments the tremors that racked his body, his fierce need to have her, became too much to bear. He wanted,needed, to be joined to her.

“Ride me,” he whispered thickly as his grip tightened in her hair.

Urgently, with barely controlled passion, he drew her upward, till she half lay upon him, her lush breasts pillowed on his chest. Settling one leg over his hips, Ariane mounted him, lowering herself onto his pulsing arousal.