Keir (32 page)

The kiss burned its way through her body, whispering in tongues of flame, telling her everything. That he wanted her. Needed her. That only his own doubts had held him back. How he had seen her as beautiful, without flaw, but so far beyond his reach he saw no reason to try.

He shook as he held her. Still afraid of rejection, still afraid she could not, would never, feel for him as he did for her.

Fresh tears filled her eyes.
“Oh, Keir…”

He broke the kiss then, drew back, fear etched across his face. But he did not let go.

She brushed her hand against his cheek, saw hope ease the uncertainty from his eyes.

“Forgive me, Quin,” he whispered, his voice low.

She smiled then reached for his hand, held it tight in her own. Without another word she led him inside.

* * * *

Keir let Quin lead him, let her pull him to the side of the bed before she loosed her hold and turned to face him. His breath caught.

So beautiful…

A smile lit her face. She reached for his hands, tugged him closer. The warmth of her body pressed into his as she lifted her face to offer her mouth, her eyes gazing into his. This close, he could count every freckle and see the faint tint of sapphire blue in each iris. He lowered his head and kissed her, his hands resting on her shoulders. Her lips were so warm. So soft. Desire pulsed through his veins. His need for her bound him in tightening rings of steel.

And yet doubt made him pull back.

“What’s wrong?”

“Quin…” He swallowed. “I must know you are certain. That there will be no regrets with the dawn. I would rather have nothing from you and keep your friendship, if tonight will mean that I can only see rejection in your eyes tomorrow.”

Her smile came like sunrise, golden and warming. “I’m sure.”

His fears fell away. The barricades he had kept around his mind shifted and crumbled and he felt her presence in his mind. A gentle desire. Want. Her own conviction that she held no attraction for him, that she had somehow misunderstood. He reached a tentative strand of thought to her in reassurance, but still held back as she kissed him again.

“Quin, I….” The words refused to come, embarrassment holding his tongue. “I have never…I do not…” Surely she must know? Did he really have to admit to his lack of knowledge?

She brushed his face with one hand, kept it there. “Then let me show you.” She nuzzled into him, brushed his nose with hers.

Her mind opened to his, and they both gasped as their thoughts surged together. Her warmth and light in shades of scarlet bathed him. The shadows that lay behind it, all her sorrows and losses, every bad memory and thoughtless deed swept through him, but it made her no less beautiful. He saw her soul clearly–her courage and her passion–and it lifted him from the darkness of his own and haloed him in her love. In her eyes he shone as bright as any star.

With her mouth pressed to his, he mirrored her movements, no longer afraid. His body responded instinctively and he let it guide him. His hands dropped to her waist, then found their way under the edge of her clothing to caress the bare skin beneath. She shivered at his touch, and the sparks of pleasure that danced across her body in response flared into his.

“Quin…”

He could not find any words beyond her name. His hands traveled upward, caressing her back. Her skin felt like flame wrapped in velvet, and the pleasure he drew from it echoed in her thoughts and flowed back, augmenting his own.

The euphoria flickered for a moment and dimmed. Quin pushed him back gently, her hands on his chest.

“Quin?”

She touched a finger to his lips then lifted her tunic over her head, tossing the garment aside. Heat slammed into every nerve in his body. She wore nothing underneath. With gentle curves clothed in creamy-colored skin, her hair fell loose over her shoulders–the only thing covering her.

Keir stopped breathing. He felt crushed by his desire. He reached out for her, brushing his fingers lightly down her arms. Afraid that somehow he might hurt her. Naked she seemed so small, so fragile.

“You won’t hurt me,”
she assured him.
“You’re not like that.”

She stepped in close and lifted the edge of his vest, peeling it back from his stomach. He stopped her and she met his gaze, her eyes dark with desire.

“I want to see you”,
she told him, her thoughts edged in a hunger that matched his own.
“I want to feel your skin against mine.”

The prospect forced a groan from his mouth and he shed his top. Her hands strayed to the buckle of his pants, and he let her strip him of them, kicking them aside when they fell to his ankles. The heat of her skin burned into his own as he drew her tight against him and kissed his way down her neck into the hollow of her throat. He wanted to pull her against him until their bodies merged into one and never let her go. He shook with the strength of it.

Quin pushed him onto their bed. He fell back and she sat astride him, placing hot kisses over his abdomen, slowly working her way up from his stomach to his neck. Fire pulsed under his skin wherever her lips touched him, and he grasped at her hair, hard-pressed to be gentle as need consumed him. It was torture beyond anything he had known. It was bliss beyond anything he had imagined. The red blaze of her passion and pleasure flooded his mind, blanking all coherent thought, binding them body and soul.

“Quin…”
Her mouth captured his and he moaned into it. He wanted to lose himself in her completely and feel her do the same. The pressure building within him had become unbearable.
“I cannot hold this…”

“You don’t have to.”
She let her own need wash over him.
“I love you.”

“I love you.”
He buried his fingers in her hair, every fiber of his being demanding her, wanting her, just as she wanted him.
She took him inside herself, and he arched his back in ecstasy as white light exploded across their minds.

“Quin!”
His breath came in shallow gasps. Their thoughts melded into a single entity until Keir could not tell where he ended and Quin began. Each surge of pleasure that he caused in her flowed back and layered over his own then spiraled back to her in turn, heightening every sensation. Euphoria came in waves, each more intense than the next, as they moved in harmony.

All words, all thought became meaningless as they soared to a peak together, until suddenly his mind snapped free, in unity with Quin’s, to a place of rapture beyond their bodies.

Together they fell into the light.

1.       
   Chapter 13
   

Early morning light gleamed pale gold on the bare, smoothed boards of the floor. Keir lay still for a moment, loosing a sigh that matched the whispering of the greenery outside the bedroom window. Contentment filled him, and a sense of wonder. He could almost believe last night had been an illusion, a fevered dream sent to torment him.

But Quin lay curled up against his side, her hair tickling his neck. The warmth of her breath whispered across his skin. Her closeness confirmed that last night had been no delusion, however unreal it seemed. Even now, he felt as if she had shown him yet another world, stranger and more wonderful than those he had seen so far. One he could never have reached without her. Locked together in both mind and body, there could be no pretense of affection or falsehoods, a complete sharing beyond mere physical union: a baring of souls. She had opened her heart and her mind to him, to unveil a depth of passion to match his own, and so banished all his doubts and insecurities. She had made herself vulnerable to him in every way, taken him inside her, body and soul. Given herself unconditionally and asked nothing in return. Accepted him as he was without judgment.

He rolled over to face her, almost unable to believe in her existence–as if she had risen from an ancient myth or impossible dream. Her auburn hair formed a tangled mess around a face child-like in sleep and a well of tenderness opened in him. Amazed at his own temerity, he lifted a vagrant strand of her hair and brushed it back from her face, touching her skin lightly with his fingertips. The faint movement roused her from sleep, but she greeted him with a smile that warmed him more than all the sunlight cascading across their bedroom.

“Good morning,” she murmured, her voice soft and drowsy.

“I am sorry. I did not mean to wake you.”

She stretched theatrically, the smile deepening as she blinked the last traces of sleepiness from her eyes. “I don’t mind,” she assured him, nevertheless making herself snug back in the bed, as if intending to remain there the rest of the day.

Unable to resist the temptation, he reached for her hair again, smoothing it back where it had fallen across her shoulder, and his hand lingered. “What have you done to me, Quin?”

Her smile faded at his question, unease marring her face. “What do you mean?”

“You have changed everything.” Could he have imagined this a few months ago, a few days ago even? To not only have a life far beyond anything he could envisage, but to be sharing it with a woman he loved so deeply he could find no words?

“Is that a good thing?”

“Without question. But, sometimes, I wonder…the day we first met, did I die in that cell? Are you the angel who came for my soul?”

“I’m no angel!” she insisted, but her voice was pleased and she smiled.

“You are to me. Even though I was not the soul you meant to save.” He sighed heavily, and with deep reluctance his mind turned to more practical considerations. “We should be working on the raft, if escape is still your intention.”

“Are you always going to be so ruthlessly single-minded?” she demanded, eyebrows arched inquiringly.

“Every time we are stranded on a desert island by persons unknown,” he teased. “Why, what did you have in mind?”

She leaned forward then and kissed him gently in answer, as if unsure of his reaction.

He stared at her, surprised by her uncertainty as she blushed under his close regard. “You doubt yourself, even now?”

“You read me too easily now.”

“Last night I read everything.” The memory of all he had seen inside her, all he had felt and shared with her surged through him in a hot rush. “Is it always like that?”

“Sometimes it’s better.”

“Better?” He hesitated, sudden fear crowding his mind. “Was that not…good?”

She stared at him, her expression very intent. “Keir. You felt everything I did.” She slid one hand around the side of his neck, brushing her fingers through his hair. “Didn’t you?”

“Yes. It was…” The words evaded him and his breath caught. He drew on the memories and fire coursed under his skin. “It was like dying and coming back to life. Like a vision of heaven.” Desire coiled through him again but he needed to know. “You were holding something back though. I could feel it.”

Quin sighed. “Keir, I’m three hundred years old. Do you want all of that in your head?” She ran her fingers across his cheek, trailed them down his neck to his chest. Again her thoughts echoed his need, resonating with want. “I hold back to protect you, nothing more. In time, you’ll know it all. I promise.”

“I would know all of it now,”
he told her, his arm encircling her waist and drawing her closer. She yielded willingly, molding herself against his body, as her arms snaked around him in return.

“One thing at a time, my love.”

“We do need to finish the raft
though,”
he reminded her, his tone halfhearted as he kissed her with meaning, losing himself in the warmth and softness of her embrace.

“Later.”

* * * *

Much later, they lay side by side in bed, watching the sun make languid patterns of light through the leaves. Quin slid her hand across his bare stomach, playfully following the spiral pattern of a tattoo with one finger. Still in the warm aftermath of union, Keir found the touch soothing instead of stirring the demanding heat of passion. But as she traced the symbol downwards, he snatched her hand away from further mischief.

“Stop that,” he scolded.

“Why?”

“It tickles.” He held her hand to his chest instead. Small hands with short fingers, and yet they had the power to rouse so much emotion in him.

“I don’t make you flinch now, then?”

He laughed. “I think you have proven that.” As she nestled into him, he brushed his fingertips over the back of her hand. “So many times I wanted to touch you, wanted you to touch me. I felt ashamed of that desire. Afraid you would hate me for it.”

“Oh, Keir…” Quin sighed. “I wouldn’t have hated you. I thought you knew me better than that.”

“You show such compassion to everyone. But I had no reason to think you would gift me with anything more than that.”

“And you kept yourself so tightly shielded, I had no idea.” She chuckled. “What a pair of idiots!”

Keir shared in her amusement. “Perhaps being stranded here has not been such a curse?”

“Mmm. It has had its benefits.” As if considering what they might be, she drew her hand down his torso in a slow, provocative caress.