Heart of the Flame (25 page)

Behind her she heard the soft scuff of retreating feet, then the quiet thud and snick of metal as the servants made their exit and the chamber door closed on their heels.

Kenrick's hand brushed the back of her neck as he swept her unbound hair aside, baring her skin to his touch...to his kiss.

"You are trembling, Haven."

"Am I?"

"Aye, lady. Like a leaf before a storm. Do you not wish to be here with me? God's love, how I want you--I need you--but I could never cause you any fear or distress."

"No." She gave a weak shake of her head. "Never. 'Tis just..."

"Tell me." His mouth seared the delicate hollow behind her ear, his low rolling voice driving the darkness of her thoughts back into the shadows.

"The memories," she whispered, scarcely able to speak for the dizzying sparks of pleasure that ignited with Kenrick's every stroke of his fingers, every seductive press of his lips as he kissed a trail of heat along her neck and into the curve of her shoulder. "My memories are dark. They grasp at me sometimes. I can feel their claws sinking into me, dragging me down..."

"You are safe," Kenrick murmured. "There is naught to harm you here."

"There is no safety where the memories would lead me. I can feel that much. And today, that man in the barn--I just...I don't want to relive that night anymore. It hurts to think on it."

"I know, sweeting. I know." With gentle hands at her shoulders, Kenrick slowly turned her around to face him. "No one should be made to witness the hell you knew in Greycliff's raid. I would make it better for you if I could."

Haven burrowed into the warmth of his arms, pressing her cheek against his chest. "You do make it better. Just feeling your arms around me banishes the horror of it...and the pain."

"Then let me hold you, my lady." Taking her hand in his, he guided her toward the waiting bathtub near the fireplace. "There is only us now. Let's wash away all traces of that night and this morning. Let me hold you."

She walked the few scant paces with him, her fingers caught loosely in his. He brought her near the steaming pool of the bath, stripped off his soiled tunic and tossed it aside. Bare chested and glorious, he began to slowly disrobe her. Haven stood there, his willing thrall, as he untied the laces of her gown. The silk cording whispered out of its neat row of eyelets, then softly fell in a small coil at her feet.

Kenrick bent his head and kissed her as his deft fingers sought the loosened bodice that now sagged in a revealing crush between her breasts. His hand slid within, seeking out and finding the aching buds of her nipples. The little peaks surged tighter at his touch, yearning for more of his caress. She wanted more...so much more.

There was no curbing her small moan of dismay as he left off, moving his hands away from the needy ache of her breasts to slide her loosened bodice over her shoulders.

The gown made a slow descent down the length of her body, leaving her standing before him in naught but the thin covering of her shift.

"Still you tremble," he murmured, his heavy-lidded gaze dragging up to meet her own.

"From pleasure," she said. "And from anticipation."

His smile was a wicked twist of his lips that fair stole her breath. So handsome was he, her golden lord. As handsome and as darkly skilled as the most learned sorcerer.

"What is it you crave of me?" he asked, deviltry gleaming in the muted indigo of his eyes. "My touch, perhaps?"

She could not speak, for in that moment he cupped her breast in his palm, smoothing the pad of his thumb over the taut crown of her nipple, which rose like a pebble beneath her chemise.

"Mayhap you crave my kiss."

The sweet torment of his touch was compounded at once with the heat of his mouth on hers. He teased her lips with a sensual joining that sent quivers of sensation to the very core of her being. Too soon, he broke their kiss to trace his mouth along her jaw, then down the column of her throat. He sampled her skin with what seemed a barely restrained hunger, his teeth nicking here and there as he made a moist, burning path to the shallow dip at the base of her neck.

She dropped her head back and let him plunder at will, only vaguely aware of the scuttling chill of air that hit her bared flesh as Kenrick untied the ribbon of her chemise and eased the fine undergarment off her body.

A note of tenderness dimmed his gaze as he caught sight of the bandage wrapped about her shoulder.

"Will it hurt you at all..."

"No," she replied, moved by his gentle care, which was unnecessary. The wound did not pain her any longer. It was all but healed in the short time since she had been at Clairmont, the new skin concealed by the pristine bandage that covered it.

Kenrick gave her no time to think on the queer healing of her injury. He stooped down before her, tasting his way into the heart of her bosom.

With caressing hands and a questing mouth, he laved her breasts both in turn. Jolts of desire arced through her as he suckled her nipples, teasing the tender buds until she could scarce endure the pleasure. He kissed the narrow space between them, pausing to sample the buoyant swell and the sensitive skin beneath it.

Then his kiss drifted lower still.

Haven sucked in a breath of shock to feel his mouth skim along her belly. His tongue darted into the cleft of her navel, the sensation so purely sensual--so unexpected--she jerked in reaction. He steadied her with gentle hands splayed at her hips.

"Trust me, sweetness. I want you very much, but I vow I will take things slow between us now."

Haven's answer was a deep, throaty sigh. "Oh my dear, noble lord," she gasped, body quivering at his every touch. "Your skilled restraint is like to be my undoing."

But he seemed disinclined to give her quarter. Every seductive stroke of his mouth and lips and tongue made her yearn for more. As though he sensed this about her, he proceeded with maddening patience, as if he meant to sample every inch of her in his own time.

Such exquisite torment.

He paused in his slow unraveling of her senses, and drew back from her slightly. Where his mouth had ceased its exploration, now his gaze began to drink her in. Haven felt the heat of that gaze like a thousand fingers of flame. Tickling, teasing, his eyes traced a path of hungry indigo fire from her own yearning gaze, to her parted lips which still tingled from his kisses, to the rosy crowns of her breasts, and on...to the smoothness of her belly, and the thatch of dark amber curls nestled between her thighs.

His gaze was so nakedly lustful, it scorched her, but if she burned, it was with wanton bliss. And a keening need for more of all he would give her.

"You are beautiful, Haven. So incredibly soft. Every bit of you so tempting."

Kenrick was on his knees before her.

Faith preserve her, but he was poised so close to the core of her femininity that his rough, fast-soughing breath stirred the flossy patch of down. He bent forward, and shocked her with the sudden press of his lips against her.

Haven arched taut at the contact, torn between moving away and toward the unexpected contact. But Kenrick's hands were firm at her hips, holding her in place as his tongue slid along the crevice of her womanhood. She cried out, unable to bear the sweet torture of his intimate kiss. His tongue was slick and hot, parting her like a flower. Her body wept for him, drawing taut as a bowstring with every flick of his sorcerer's tongue. He found the bud of her desire and sampled it with dizzying strokes, working a spell of dark seduction on the part of her that knew no shame.

But he took just a taste, enough to wring an anguished moan from her lips, and then he was gone.

"You are sweeter than any honey," he whispered, his voice thick as he glided his hands down the length of her thigh. "Softer than the finest silk."

He pressed a kiss to the tender skin, and gently lifted her slippered foot onto his lap. Her shoe came off as his lips teased the slight bend of her knee. As though she were made of glass, he carefully placed her bare foot down on the woven mat of rushes. Then he did likewise to her other leg, masterfully removing the last of her clothing and leaving her standing before him utterly nude and trembling with sensation.

"Your bath awaits, my lady."

His stare narrowed slightly as she shook her head.

"Our bath," Haven corrected him.

Her fingers toyed at the rolled waistband of his trousers. The drawstring ties hung down from the knot that held his remaining clothing. She could not keep her gaze from drifting to the pronounced rise of his loose-fitting garb. His arousal strained high and proud, the blunt tip outlined by the linen draping him like a tent.

Haven swallowed, her throat parched with desire. Kenrick stood before her like some lord of legend, a towering golden idol of sinew and strength, and seductive splendor. He looked more warrior than poet now, an unholy vision of pure masculinity that called to something deep and primal within her.

Her wanton gaze would not leave that part of him that was steel and silk combined. She caught the tail of one drawstring cord and tugged it loose. Her fingers brushed against him--only the slightest whisper of contact--but his arousal leaped within its fabric confines. Haven smiled up at him, knowing the impatience he wore so visibly in his taut expression. It had been hers but a moment ago, the resonant pulse of desire still thrumming through her like the beat of tiny drums. She knew the exquisite anguish of longing, and she wanted to deal it as surely as had been dealt to her.

She leaned in and placed an open kiss on Kenrick's bare chest, suckling the flat disk of his nipple between her teeth. Her tongue circled the male bud, drawing it tight. Then she withdrew, denying him when he grew still under her mouth, his breath rasping out of him on a curse.

She went back to the tied points of his hose and braies, allowing her fingers to drift across the hard plane of his abdomen before she sought another of the knotted strings. Kenrick jerked under her barest touch, his golden skin sheening and hot beneath her fingertips. He made a strangled sound in the back of his throat, an impatient sound that gave Haven a measure of supreme satisfaction. When he reached down to assist her in undressing him, Haven placed her hand over his, halting his impatient fingers.

"We are to take this slowly," she said, reminding him of his own pledge that nearly drove her to madness. "No rushing, was that not what we agreed?"

His answering chuckle was deep with amusement. "You are too clever by half, sweet witch."

Haven only smiled, then returned to the enticing completion of her task. A second tied knot came free with measured deliberation. The others fell in likewise fashion, slowly, one after another, until just one slender strand remained. Kenrick watched her with smoldering interest, a purely male smile curving the corner of his mouth.

Holding the indigo fire of his gaze, she tugged the final lacing that concealed him from her full view.

Kenrick's low oath held far more reverence than curse as Haven slipped her palms between the slack linen and the velvety firmness of his hips. She eased his trousers down, sinking to her knees before him as she smoothed her hands along his legs from muscular thigh to tendoned ankle. His feet were bare; he had no doubt removed his boots surreptitiously while she was busy losing herself to the seductive wonder of his touch.

Haven carefully stripped him of his hose and braies, then she leaned back to look upon the naked splendor of her golden warrior.

He was magnificent.

Faith, but it had been easy enough before to see why the castle maids whispered of him with girlish shades of pink in their cheeks, all of them flirting with the aloof overlord as much as they stood wary of his stoic, secretive manner.

Now, gazing upon him here, Haven knew the weight of that feminine desire some hundredfold. Kenrick was a vision of masculine perfection, from his golden crown of close-cropped hair, to his broad shoulders, bronzed chest, and trim, muscular waist.

And there was more perfection the farther she dared to glance.

Although she had anticipated nothing less, seeing that part of Kenrick that was unabashedly, impressively male, stole her breath. She could not keep from staring at the rigid beauty of him...nor could she resist the sudden overwhelming urge to touch.

His flesh leaped at the first brush of her fingertips. Haven stroked him softly, utterly intrigued with the incredible satin smoothness that sheathed so much steely strength. His sex was thick and large in her palm, its heavy girth filling her hand from the tips of her fingers to past her wrist. A drop of moisture beaded at its blunt crown, a silky warmth that dampened her fingers as she dared to stroke him.

At Kenrick's low growl, Haven dragged her gaze up the golden length of his body. He was watching her with an intensity that made her stomach quiver. His sensual mouth was held taut, his fine nostrils flaring with every breath that rasped into his lungs. And his eyes--mercy, but the look in his eyes was so feral, so heated and raw, Haven knew not whether her boldness pleased him or enraged him.

"If you wish me to stop..." she said, her voice trailing off as she glided her fingertips along the underside of his shaft, from the thick base of his sex to the glistening head. "I don't know quite how...to touch you."