The draught of air across his back and a sharp indrawn breath were the only warning he had that he was not alone. Nathan stood very still as the door clicked shut. It was her, no one else would have entered without knocking or speaking, no one else brought the faint sensual drift of frangipani and roses on the hot air.
‘Oh, your beautiful back,’ she breathed in distress.
Nathan took a deep breath, telling himself that it was all to the good if she found his scars repellent, and turned.
Clemence was standing there, not in the thin nightrail of his imaginings but a most proper wrapper concealing her from chin to toe. He let out the breath, then almost choked as he saw the bare toes peeping from under the frilled hem.
‘Clemence, what are you doing here?’
‘Your back needs oiling, it will help relax the scarring and make it more comfortable.’ She put down a jug on the table beside his logs and began to roll up her sleeves. ‘Lie down.’
‘What!’ In the nick of time Nathan recalled the thinness of the walls and got the volume down to a hiss. ‘You cannot come in here with me half-naked and massage my back!’
‘But I can’t do it when you’ve got your shirt on,’ she said in the voice of someone humouring a fractious child. ‘It will do it good.’
He knew it would, he could feel the cool slide of oil across the tender skin even as she spoke. ‘I am sure you are correct, but you aren’t going to do it.’
‘I am.’ In the lantern light Clemence looked very determined. She held up her hands. ‘See? Smooth. Smoother than anyone else’s on board. It is important for your work that you are fit—don’t be a prude, Nathan.’
A prude? He had never felt less prudish in his life, which was half the problem. ‘Very well, then.’ He drew his belt through the trouser loops with a crack of leather and tossed it on to his shirt, then lay down on his bunk, buried his face in his arms and surrendered to whatever she wanted to do to him.
Chapter Sixteen
Nathan lay trying to follow Clemence’s actions with his hearing alone. There was a rustle of fabric, over by the chair. Her wrapper? Then the soft pad of her bare feet back towards him, the sound as she put the jug on the floor beside the bunk. At least it was narrow; that would restrict her reach somewhat.
Then there was pressure alongside his right thigh, then the l
eft, and weight came down on his buttocks. ‘Clemence!’ Nathan tried to buck her off, but she came down with both palms flat on his shoulder blades, flattening him back to the bed.
‘Lie still, this is the only way I can do this properly.’ He wriggled. ‘I can’t be too heavy.’
With a faint groan Nathan surrendered. At least the tickle of fabric at the top of his trousers told him that she was still wearing something, which was a mercy.
Then she bent down to pick up the jug and her weight shifted and her thighs tightened to help her balance and he realised that there was nothing merciful about this whatsoever.
‘The oil might feel cool,’ she warned. It dribbled into the small of his back, making him draw in a reflexive breath and shiver with sensual anticipation. ‘Sorry.’
He did not feel up to explaining that this was already verging on more pleasure than he felt capable of taking. In an effort to control his own reactions he said harshly, ‘I wonder you care to look at my back, much less touch it.’
‘They are honourable scars,’ Clemence said softly, putting the heels of both hands into the small of his back and pressing lightly as they slid upwards. ‘How could I be repelled by them? I know how much courage they represent.’
It silenced him, humbled him, too. ‘Clemence—’
‘Shh. Just relax.’
It seemed impossible. How could a man relax with that soft feminine weight pressing his loins into the firm mattress, shifting and clinging as she worked? Her hands were firm and gentle and she seemed to understand exactly how much pressure to apply to the new skin, just where the underlying bruising was still tender.
Gradually he found he was drifting, the rhythm of her hands and the shifting balance of her body almost mesmeric. The noises of the ship working around them faded and he slid into something that was not sleep—a trance, perhaps.
This was sensual in a way he could not have imagined contact with a woman could be. Clemence was not teasing or enticing, she had no intention of using this as a prelude to lovemaking, she was too much of an innocent for those sort of games. She was doing this for him in the same way as she had tended to him after the flogging.
Under her hands his back muscles relaxed as they had not since the moment he had realised that the punishment was inevitable. As the oil sank into his skin the soreness vanished and all that was left was a heightened sensitivity, a feeling of dreamlike power, the fantasy that they were part of one another.
Her hands slowed, slid up either side of his spine in one long sweep, then moved down until they were on the mattress, on either side. She bent forward and Nathan hung there in his sensual trance as her nipples brushed his back through the soft lawn of her gown and her breath feathered the nape of his neck.
‘Are you asleep?’ she whispered.
No. No, I want to roll over and take you in my arms and make love to you until you faint with pleasure, that was the honest answer. With will-power he did not know had, Nathan lay still, breathing deeply. After a moment she smiled, her mouth so close to his skin that he could feel the change in her breathing, then she straightened up and climbed carefully off his shattered body.