The Viking's Woman (14 page)

But then she was joined by a man.

He heard fragments of her whispers. He wanted to leave the lovers together but could not go without being seen.

He saw their garments seem to slide away. He saw the exquisite beauty of her back, naked even of her hair, for it had been bound high and knotted in a braid. She had been achingly beautiful, the curves of her breasts just visible to him, her fine, molded buttocks
flaring out from a tiny waist and touched with delicate dimples on either side of the small of her back. Her neck was long and graceful, and her shoulders were beautifully sloped and supple. He caught his breath as he watched her, and then he again longed to be far away, for he did not wish to disturb a pair of star-crossed lovers.

Then he heard their words clearly, and within moments he realized who the woman was.

Rhiannon. His betrothed.

Fury exploded within him.

He could not allow it. He had not wanted to enter her life, but she had been given over to him, and what was his he guarded carefully.

She was to be his wife!

The rage swept through him and he fought to control it.

Perhaps the lovers had met and mated here, in the tall grasses, many times before.

He was not about to let them betray him now, or ever again. He stood hastily, reaching for his sword, lest the foolish young buck think to fight him.

He did not have a chance to reach the lovers, for the quiet clearing by the brook was suddenly shattered by the sounds of hoofbeats. “Find them!” someone shouted. “By the king’s honor, find them!”

Rhiannon cried out and jumped to her feet. She hadn’t time to dress, but her lover rose with her, casting her mantle about her.

“Run!” he urged her. “Reach the clearing!”

“Nay, the king will not kill me. He could well slay you! Oh, Rowan, if harm comes to you—”

“Go!” the young swain ordered her. He shoved her toward the place where Eric stood.

“Nay, not until you return! You run. If they do not find us together, they cannot charge you with my disappearance, or with—” She broke off, her voice trailing away miserably.

“I will run!” he promised her, and he propelled her onward again.

She came stumbling through the foliage. Eric stood still, fighting his rage. Riders thrashed their way through the grasses, and he knew that she was desperate to elude them. She came crashing through the water of the brook, and she stumbled right before him. She saw the hem of his mantle and grabbed it.

“Sir, kind sir, I beg of you, help me! My guardian is marrying me off to a Viking bastard, and I am desperate to elude pursuit at this moment. Please! My life shall be spent with a viperous rodent, but I—”

Her silvery blue eyes at last rose to his, filling with amazement. She recognized him, but Eric realized then that she didn’t know just who he was. Stunned terror followed the amazement, and her ivory skin grew pale and as white as snow.

Rhiannon realized with numbing horror that she had come upon the Viking. There was no help here. Nay, she faced disaster.

“Oh, no!” she gasped. “You!”

She had to elude this man. She rose with lightning-quick speed and spun around. But before she could run, he reached for her. His boot fell upon her mantle, and it tore from her shoulders. He spun her around, and she came, naked, into the brutal grip of his arms.

Maybe he had forgotten her.

No, he had not.

He remembered her—that was all too evident. He remembered her arrows—and her knee, no doubt. She had never seen such a dark fury lay hold upon a man’s face before. A weakness filled her. He was surely the Irish prince’s bloody henchman. He would return her to Alfred or to his own liege lord. Or perhaps he would slay her and not even the king would protest.

“Have mercy!” she whispered, tossing her head back. Her braid tumbled down. The heavy locks broke free from their twining and came cascading down her back. She longed to sweep it about her to clothe herself.

But he did not look at her nudity; he stared into her eyes and a dark, brooding hatred remained within his own.

“Mercy?” he inquired. It was voiced softly and yet with a deadly menace. “Mercy?”

She cried out as he dragged her closer, slamming her against the heated power of his chest. He gripped her hands so tightly that she feared he would crush her wrists, and she was forced to feel the hard, towering length of him, and the brutal anger that coursed icily from his eyes into her own and onward to her heart.

“I fought you because I thought we were under attack!” she told him swiftly. “I would not have caused you injury had I known that you came at the king’s invitation. Please, let me go now! You must have mercy because—”

“No, lady, no. I do not think so.”

“But—”

“It has nothing to do with the deadly arrow you meant for my heart, the one that struck my thigh and causes me to limp to this day. Nor does it have to do with your delicate knee slamming against my groin or your elegant fists tearing into my chest. Nay, lady, all of those I could perhaps forgive.”

“Then—”

“You shall have no mercy from me because I am, you see, that viperous rodent; the bastard, barbaric Viking to whom you are betrothed.”

Her mouth parted and fell into an
O
of horror. And then she cast back her head and screamed in sheer, mad panic, jerking her wrists desperately to free herself. She screamed again and again as horror filled her, cold, icy, seeping throughout her. She was in his power. Naked and vulnerable, crushed against him. She felt acutely the awful strength of his chest, thighs, and arms.

“You!” she breathed.

“Aye, lady, me!”

This could not be the Irish prince!

“Oh, God, no!” she whispered, and she pitted herself against him again, as wild as a tigress. There was nothing left to salvage; she had to escape him and flee.

She could not ease his hold upon her, and she tried to bite his flesh. When that failed, she raised her knee with wicked insinuation against him again.

“Hold!” he raged at her, and swept her up and furiously cast her down upon the earth. Breathless, her hair tumbling all about her like a heavenly fire, she stared up at him. Her breasts lay bare beneath the
fall of her hair. She realized her vulnerable state, and a desperate sound escaped her as she tried to rise.

He stepped over her fallen body, placing one booted foot on either side of her hips, catching her hair beneath his tread so that she could not move.

Then he came slowly down himself, straddling her. She lifted her fists to beat against his chest, but his hands seized her wrists and he pressed them hard to the earth on either side of her head. His body was against hers, hard and merciless. Powerful and vibrant, like heated steel.

She could not free herself.

Yet as he stared at her, his mouth a line of fury, his hold a touch of iron, she realized with a searing dread that her dream had been prophetic—her Viking adversary was the prince of Dubhlain.

“We meet again, lady,” he said softly. The ice-blue fire of his eyes entered her very soul, searing her. She wondered just what he had seen, what he had heard.

Everything …

“And under such … interesting circumstances. I had nearly determined that there might be a slim chance of peace between us, and yet I come to Wareham for my wedding, and what do I discover? My bride, naked to the core, awaiting me.”

He moved away from her at last, still straddling her hips, balancing his weight upon his haunches. The cold morning air swept over her flesh, causing her breasts to swell beneath his gaze, her nipples to harden. He had barely seemed to notice her nakedness before; now he inspected her with brazen disdain, and the touch of his eyes brought fire to her flesh.

Life returned to her. She twisted beneath him, trying to evade the hold of his thighs. “Let me up, free me!” she commanded.

“Nay, lady, nay!” he promised her softly. His Nordic eyes impaled her, striking her heart like a shaft of cold steel. He leaned closer to her once again, his breath touching her lips. “Not until the day you die, my sweet.”

A black wave of terror seemed to engulf her. She fought it, determined that she’d never show him fear.

“Tell the king that you don’t want me!” she whispered fervently. “Tell him—”

“Would you have a war so fierce that your land would run with rivers of blood?” he demanded harshly.

“But you cannot want me—” Rhiannon broke off as she heard the thunder of hoofbeats again. The king’s men were coming close.

The Viking stood and reached down for her wrists, jerking her to her feet and, for a moment, hard against himself. “No, lady, I do not want to wed you!” he assured her quickly. He released her. She stared into his eyes for a brief second and then turned, instinctively, to run. His fingers closed savagely on her hair, and she cried out as she was wrenched back against him. His whisper touched her ear.

“Come now, you mustn’t be a coward,” he told her harshly. “I had admired your courage, at least.”

She faced him again, hatred tripping from her tongue. “Nay, I do not fear you, and I shall never fear you. You’ve no power to hurt me, ever!”

He smiled at her but it was a grim smile, and his eyes were like frozen fjords in the height of winter’s
fury. “I do suggest that you learn to fear me, lady. Aye, I do suggest that you learn to fear me—and quickly. There’s much you need to fear.”

She longed to keep her chin high, but she was naked, and his ice-blue gaze swept dispassionately and with contempt over the length of her.

The horses pounded ever closer. His gaze flickered away and he knelt, picked up her mantle, and drew it around her shoulders. She wanted to bolt, to run, and she could scarcely breathe. She was amazed that he had covered her nakedness. Tears sprang behind her lids, but there was no kindness to the act, she quickly discovered.

“I believe you’ve exposed enough of what is supposedly mine for this day, don’t you, milady?” He arched a brow but did not wait for an answer. He did not expect one.

She found her voice even as he turned from her, whistling for his mount.

“I will never be yours!”

His mount came forward, and she gasped with surprise. Numbness filled her. The horse was hers. It was Alexander, her favorite stallion.

“That’s my horse!” she cried.

“My
horse,” he corrected her.

She had forgotten that he held all that had been hers.

His smile, a chilling one, remained in place when he looked at her again. “My horse,” he repeated. “And as this animal, lady, is mine, so you shall be. And you, too, will learn to come when I call. If I still choose it to be so. A used horse is one thing, a used wife another.”

She gasped. “Vile bastard—” she began, but her words were cut off in a frenzied protest as she felt the biting power of his fingers once again, closing around her arm.

“Nay!” she cried in panic, but he ignored her, sweeping her off her feet and into his arms. In terror she attempted to strike him, to claw him, to free herself. He secured her wrists with one swift measure. His gaze alone stilled her then. “Lady, push me no further!”

He waited. She could not move. She clenched her teeth together and fought the rising panic within her.

He nearly threw her atop the white stallion, then quickly mounted behind her. “Don’t fight me,” he warned her. “Don’t even think of it, for if you attempt to strike me again, I promise that I will strike more swiftly—and with greater effect.”

She choked back her rage at his callous words.

“Barbarian!” she accused him, but she did not move. His eyes narrowed.

“Shall I show you?” he inquired.

Rhiannon fell silent. He nudged the horse forward, and her mind began to race even as she shivered against the powerful feel of his arms about her.

The king’s men were almost upon them, and suddenly it was too much for her.

She had dishonored Alfred. Alas, when she had meant at last to obey him, she had dishonored him. She had truly meant to go through with her wedding, to create the alliance the king desired.

But it had all gone wrong. And though innocent in truth, she had been caught by the very man to whom
she had been promised. A man who had already sworn her vengeance ….

There would be no help for her from the king.

Rowan! She thought desperately. This loathsome Viking had seen them together. He would seek out Rowan. He would demand recompense.

Blood would run, and the burden of it would be hers.

Blackness danced before her eyes, and the mercy she had pleaded for came her way at last.

She passed out cold, yet even as consciousness eluded her, she realized that she was being caught by the strong arms of the very man she was so desperate to elude.

Her Viking master …