Page 23

CHAPTER 23

I must be out of me mind.

Anna knew she ought to remove the blindfold and put a stop to this before it became something risky, something that could steal away the privilege of choice that she’d striven so hard for. If anyone saw them, she would be compromised, with no other alternative but to marry Gordon.

Yet, listening to the sound of his shallow breaths, feeling the whisper of each one against her skin, relishing in the proximity of him and the anticipation of what he might do, she couldn’t bear the idea of stopping. Her mind was too clouded with desire to know, or care, whether the reward outweighed the risk.

“Let me touch yer face,” she whispered, figuring it was only fair that she should be allowed to feel what she hadn’t been permitted to see.

Gordon grazed his lips against her neck. “Ye willnae touch me at all.”

“But… how can I nae?”

She thought of the woods and the study, of how good it felt to run her hands through his hair and over his body, exploring the sculpted muscle that made him so feared. Indeed, what would have been fairest of all was if he had also removed his clothes.

In answer to her question, Gordon pressed his weight against her, pushing her backward. Yet, his arm stayed around her waist, supporting her as he lowered her to the blanket.

But when she tried to reach for him, stroking her hands over the broad shelf of his shoulders, seeking out the curls at the nape of his neck, she received the real answer. He took hold of her wrists and stretched her arms above her head, pressing her hands down into the sand, just beyond the edge of the blanket.

“If they move, if I feel yer hands on me, I’ll make ye wait,” he murmured, his voice husky with need, stoking the flames of her own scorching desire.

Breathing hard already, no longer concentrating on the fact that she was naked on the beach, trusting in what he’d said about the concealing ledge, she gave a small nod of submission. If he wouldn’t let her touch him, so be it… as long as he touched her.

For a moment, he lay there with her, his arm still wrapped around her waist, his other hand braced against the ground at the side of her head; she couldn’t see it, but she could feel it, picturing the glorious sight of him holding himself up enough that he wouldn’t crush her, his muscles bulging with the strain.

Just as she was about to ask if he intended to merely stare at her, his lips found hers, teasing her with a tender brush of a kiss that she barely had the chance to respond to. Craving more, craving the heat and fury of the kisses they’d shared before, she had to fight to keep her arms above her head, knowing it might mean no kiss at all if she touched him.

But her frustration was soon eased by the slower, grazing burn of his mouth venturing over the edge of her jaw and down the column of her throat, moving lower still, across the heaving rise and fall of her chest. As he descended, he freed his arm from beneath her, his hand reaching for her wrists, making a point of holding them against the sand while his lips closed over the pert peak of her nipple.

She bucked as he drew that sensitive flesh into his mouth, sucking gently. “Oh… Oh, G—” She stalled on the word, choosing something more colorful, so he wouldn’t dare to stop.

He sucked again, his fingers sliding through hers, holding her hand, intertwined, for a blissful few seconds. She made the most of it, gripping his hand in return as she bucked and gasped against the bliss that began to crackle through her, each pull of his mouth robbing her of breath and sense.

Perhaps it was the blindfold, but every touch and taste and kiss felt twice as intense as it had before, and in the dim shadow of the fabric, she could believe they were in a realm where they were entirely alone.

“Aye, that feels good,” she murmured. “Oh… Oh, aye…”

Taking care to lavish attention equally, Gordon took her other nipple in his mouth and released her hand, his fingertips caressing down the length of her arm and down her neck, smoothing over her chest until his hand curved around the swell of her breast. He grasped that soft flesh, his tongue flicking against the peak of her nipple, before his kisses drew away, taking a southern course over the contours of her stomach.

Indeed, he left no part of her unkissed, his lips tracing every speck of her as if committing her body to memory. She, in turn, followed his journey with gasping, panting delight, shivering with each kiss he seared against her skin, letting it stir the embers of ecstasy that glowed within her.

As he reached the bone of her hip, drawing his tongue along the ridge, she knew what awaited her, trembling in anticipation of his particular talents. And though her thighs were still pressed together, her shyness not yet fully overcome, he didn’t hesitate to slide his hand between those thighs, easing her legs apart.

If this is our first “ rendezvous”, what might our fifth look like?

Her imagination ran wild, remembering stories she’d heard from the castle maids, who had been gossiping without realizing they had an eavesdropper in their midst. She’d had no real idea what they were talking about until she’d met Gordon, until she’d felt his hands on her for the first time… among other things that she’d felt.

Her breath caught as she heard him lie down, gasping in surprise as his arms curved around her thighs, and she felt the brush of his hair against the sensitive skin of her inner thighs.

She had no time to recover her breath before his tongue made its first teasing stroke. Yet, that light touch might as well have been an earthquake, splintering through her with such force that her back arched up off the blanket. And her hands almost reached for him.

“Oh, Gordon!” she cried out, a moan escaping her throat as he tasted her again.

If it killed her, she would keep her hands where they were. Indeed, it would surely kill her if he stopped now, and she wouldn’t give him any reason to.

His tongue curled around that bundle of explosive nerves, and sucked gently, sending her entire body into a frenzy: her limbs shook, her blood roared in her ears, her lungs were on fire, her stomach fluttered wildly, and her head swam, swept up in the intensity that pummeled through her veins. It was the greatest feeling she had ever known, and though she was lying on the blanket, aware of the sand shifting underneath, she felt as if she were flying instead.

“Aye… oh, aye…” she gasped frantically, writhing as his tongue began to circle that swollen bud, moving slowly inward to the fiery center of her pleasure.

And as he rolled his tongue against that powder keg of bliss, he withdrew one hand from around her thigh. Her breath hitched, her neck arching, as his fingertips found the wet heat of her, gliding through those slick folds until they paused at the entrance to her sex. All the while, his tongue moved against her most sensitive spot, never giving her a moment to draw a full breath.

As he curled his tongue and sucked once more, her back arching with the pull of it, he eased his finger inside her. She cried out as a fresh wave of bliss charged through her veins, sparking back and forth across her stomach, shooting up into her chest and throat. It was all too much, yet not enough, her whole body yearning for more, yearning for everything he could offer, even if she didn’t know what that meant exactly.

All she knew was that she felt truly, gloriously, divinely alive, as if this had been the key to paradise all along.

Tasting her again in long, lavish strokes, he eased another finger inside her, curving them until he touched on a hidden well of pleasure: a pulsing thread of bliss, connected to what felt like every part of her, like the last piece of a tapestry, woven into place. Layers upon layers of pure, wondrous ecstasy, hitting her all at once, giving her no choice but to be swept up by it, giving herself over to the experience.

She writhed and thrashed and bucked and called out his name, lost in the delicious storm of it all… and not once reaching out to touch him, in case it all came to an abrupt and maddening halt.

It was like she was someone else for a while, a woman who had no expectations upon her, permitted to be as wild and free as she pleased.

“Oh… Oh… Oh, aye… That feels good,” she moaned. “That feels so good. Dinnae stop… oh, daenae stop!”

Gordon’s talents were leading her toward one glorious inevitability, a sensation she now knew, and as that feeling gathered inside her, rising higher and higher toward its peak, she chased it with everything she possessed. She rocked her hips back and forth, feeling his fingers more intensely, feeling them ease in and out of her, relishing each pulse against that hidden center of bliss, while reveling in the strokes of his skilled tongue.

A moment later, she gained her fierce reward, Gordon’s faultless efforts tipping her over the edge, into the full force of her euphoria. Her conclusion was like the nearby sea sweeping in and crashing over her, no longer lapping at the cove but roaring and surging over and through her entire body. She shook at the power of it, every muscle seizing in the instant before the wave crested, her breath lodged in her throat.

She vaguely remembered crying out Gordon’s name as the world spun and time seemed to stop, her veins coursing with the potent might of her conclusion. And though she didn’t reach out for him, she finally dared to move her hands, digging them into the cool sand as pure ecstasy continued to bolt through her, filling her up with light and utter contentment.

As the feeling began to subside, she collapsed back into the blanket, bringing a hand to her chest as a satisfied smile crept onto her lips.

At the same moment, Gordon kissed the inside of her thigh and withdrew his fingers slowly, coaxing one last gasp out of her. She waited to feel him kiss his way back up to her lips, as he had done the last time, but instead she felt him pull away.

Too late, she lifted the blindfold from her eyes, squinting at the sudden assault of sunlight. In the second or two it took for her eyes to adjust, Gordon had already put his eyepatch back on, concealing the mystery of what lay behind it.

Does he really think I’d run from him?

“I think we can call that game of chess a draw,” he said, taking hold of her hands and pulling her into a sitting position.

She frowned. “ I daenae think ye played fairly.”

“Ye want to play again?” His voice was the same as usual, yet Anna could have sworn she heard the faintest note of amusement in it. Teasing her.

Grabbing her shift and pulling it on, she flashed him a smile. “I daenae think ye and I should play chess again, nay. It seems that yer version of the game has a way of cloudin’ me judgment and leavin’ me disrobed on a beach.” She paused, covering her knees with the fabric. “Indeed, for our next four engagements, I daenae think ye should touch me at all. See how ye like it.”

For the first time since she had met him, Gordon’s lips curved into a smile.

Spurred on by that sweet, surprising sight, Anna added, “I doubt ye’d last two seconds before ye gave in, and I—bein’ the great obliger of rules that I am—would have nay choice but to stop altogether.”

Fleetingly, she feared she’d gone a jest too far. But then, to her triumphant delight, her heart soared as she received the greatest reward of all: the miracle of Gordon’s laughter, rich and hearty and warm, rippling across the cove, enveloping her like an embrace.