Linna : Historical Romance (The Brocade Collection, Book 5) (28 page)

It should prove very interesting when he found out
. The thought gave her even more amusement.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

“You want to tell me what’s so funny?” he asked.

Linna laughed harder. Being held above the water was starting to warm her. That, and the off-chance that her wet, chemise-clad body was clinging to every bit of the god-like man she’d married.

“I
’m not used to being ignored.” 

His tautness sobered her
. Oh. He was probably never ignored. It was actually amazing that he went unnoticed, anywhere.

“
Really? Well. I suppose that much might be true,” she answered.

Cord glared at her
. Coming from those moss-green eyes, in that reddish brown face, it wasn’t having an intimidating effect. It had the opposite as Linna grinned.

“You’ve set yourself out to annoy me now?”

“Annoy?”  She wrinkled her nose in thought. “Not exactly. Fascinate, charm and perhaps intrigue, but annoy? Never.”

His eyebrows rose
, and he pulled back, standing upright as he regarded her. Linna used the gap to wrap her legs about his waist. She hung onto his neck, arched her back and watched him.

“
I think you should kiss me now,” she said.

“What?”

She shimmied against him. Cold water must have a very strange effect on him, because she couldn’t feel the hardness she’d always taken for granted. She tightened her legs, rotated against his loins, and was rewarded with the stirring of what she was looking for.

“
And maybe you could…touch me?” she asked.

“
Uh. Too much. And much too soon.”

“What?” she asked.

“I haven’t got to touch you in close to five years. I’m not entirely certain what my reaction will be.”

“What nonsense
! I distinctly remember about four months ago—.”

“Time’s relative, love
. I’m nearing eighty now, if I’m a day. I’ve been denied. Tormented. Toyed with. None of that helps with…uh this. Uh. You.”

“You
mean...this?”  She made little lunging motions against him and felt the immediate response exactly as she expected.

“
Oh
Bebe.
You change the rules and then offer up this body? You’re too…uh. Beautiful. Womanly. I’m warning you. There are consequences.”

“
How wonderful,” she replied, blinking slowly and deliberately before she sucked in on her lower lip.

Cord growled at her
. “You got a reason for this?” he asked.

Linna released her lip and watched him glance at it
. “I’m just playing,” she teased.

“Another game
?
Merde!
”

“You have the right to touch me
though. Remember?”

“I’d say I am touching you
. More than touching, I’m...we’re...I can’t—don’t ask for more. I don’t think I—.”

His words halted
, and his eyes widened as she tipped her shoulders so the chemise straps could slide down her arms. She watched him try to ignore it. She knew he was by set jaw. Narrowed eyes. Heavy breaths. Linna was enthralled. Her pulse jumped with each beat. The man was too handsome to be real, and he was doing amazing things to her. She felt like the consistency of jam.

She grinned up at him, then shrugged
. Her bodice slid a bit lower. She pushed her elbows into her sides a fraction to create more cleavage shadow. She watched his eyes flick there and back.

“
Actually…I think you’re almost where I want you.”

“Any closer...and we’d...be joined.”

He had trouble getting through the sentence. “True. So. So…true,” she answered, leaving her mouth in the perfect kissing pose.

She watched him
look her over before lifting his head, looking about, and frowning. Then he looked back at her. Linna blew on the exposed chest in front of her and watched the goose flesh ripple. She felt like singing.

“You’d best stop
that. Now. We’re in...a public pool.”

“And?” she prompted.

“And. And. Oh, hell.”

He tipped his head, lowered his lips to hers, and
that’s when Linna knew she had him. It wasn’t in the heat exchange her bosom experienced, or the hardness swelling against where she needed it most. It wasn’t even in the way he tilted his hips forward, heaving her completely out of the water. It wasn’t any of those things. It was in the deep groan he gave.

His cry broke their kiss
. Linna kept her lips exactly as they’d been and opened her eyes slowly. The look on his face could best be described as consternation mixed with surprise. She smiled.

“You thinking...to entice me?” he asked, in that low whisper-like tone of his.

“Oh. I’m not just thinking about it, lover-man,” she answered in what she hoped was a sultry tone.

“You
don’t care about the consequences?”

S
tammering and consternation had been replaced with something else. She knew that look. She knew what it meant, too. She’d seen it in the Larroquette room when they’d first bargained. It was feral. Masculine. Predatory. And it created shivers hat flew her arms, and came to rest in the taut nerve endings of her nipples.

“I wouldn’t call on your response, if I didn’t want it,” she
finally answered.

“This pond is too public,” he said, through clenched teeth.

“You get shy of a sudden?” she asked.

She’d surprised him
. She could tell by the indrawn breath. “Woman, I will not be responsible for what I do if you continue in this vein. I am not shy. I’ve taken women in full view of others. I’ve been cheered on. I will not take you that way. You are different.”

“How?” she asked in a whisper.

“They were whores.”

“Why does that make it different
? You don’t like what you see? You’ve seen better perhaps? Taken better?” 

She was going to have her answer now
. She watched him frown as he puzzled through her words. She not only thought about touching the little crease in his forehead, she did it, tightening her legs for balance on his hips so she could run her fingertips along his wrinkle and push the lock of hair out of the way. Her breasts made contact with his chest, although she moved away the moment it happened.
Enticing
, he called it? It was self-torment!

He swore viciously
. “What is wrong with you? You want vindication? You want me on my knees begging?”

“You’d do that?”

He narrowed his eyes. “You are perfect, Woman. The image of perfection. You know it. You’ve always known it. There is no comparison. I can barely hold in my response, and you ask questions? What kind of game are we playing now?”

Linna
pulled up, so her lips were near his ear. She blew softly at it, and was rewarded with a tremor that shook both of them. “You looking for a release in my body, Cord? Or…do you want to make love? I’m new to this, but even I know there’s a difference.”

“What
? There’s...no difference,” he answered.

“
Oh. I think there is. I can get what you give from any man, but I want it to be you. That’s what I want. That’s what I need.”

“You do this with another man and I’ll kill him
! You hear? I’ll—”

Linna ran her tongue along the faded bruising on his neck, stopping his words with a choke
d noise. “I think that sort of reaction might mean something. What do you think?”

“What
? No. You don’t know. Oh, Linna...
love
.”

He tried to pull her away, but Linna
didn’t let him. She’d sucked on his skin and slid her lips up his neck. He wrenched out of her reach when she got to the bottom of his chin. He put both hands beneath her armpits and pushed her back from him. He couldn’t do a thing about how her legs stayed locked about his hips. He was glaring at her with a pained, lust-filled look.

“What...do you think you’re doing?” he asked, in a controlled voice.

“I think it’s pretty obvious,” she answered.

“We have...company,” he answered, motioning with his head over her shoulder
. Linna didn’t look. She didn’t care. She didn’t move her gaze from his.

“So?” she answered.

That shocked him. She watched his jaw drop open with delight. She wondered if he’d felt it when she looked at him with her mouth wide open. Then told herself she was being ridiculous. He didn’t feel anything.

Or so, he said.

She flicked her glance to both sides of the pond without moving her head. There wasn’t a soul in sight. “There’s no one here,” she accused.

“Around the rock, at the creek
. Listen, you’ll hear them.”

“All I can hear is running water,” she replied, “and it isn’t from any creek
. That’s one of the signs of loving you, remember?”

He could blind someone with that smile
, she thought, as her words sunk in.

“I am not wearing a stitch, baby.”

“I know,” she replied.

“My clothes are somewhere over
yonder.”

“I know,” she said again.

“I can’t move without all and sundry knowing what you do to me.”

She matched his grin
. “I know.”    

“You know I won’t take you in this public place
. You know what you’re doing to me, and you aren’t going to help me manage it?”

His fingers
might leave bruises as his fingers tightened where he held her. Linna pulled both arms out of their straps. Then she slid a finger along the top of her chemise, lowering. It was worse than self-torment. It was excruciating self-torment.

“I want you to make love to me, Cordean,” Linna whispered.

“Oh...
Bebe
,” he replied.

His trembling increased
, and his knees sagged, if the cold dip her buttocks received was any indication. Icy water lapped against her heat. Then he was stalking out of the pond, holding her pinned to him. Linna kept her gaze on his face. She couldn’t say one word.

“How far are we from our house?”
she asked.

“Our
house
?” he repeated in growled voice.

“
All right. Any house with a bed...and hurry.”   

Cord stopped, flicked that greenish gaze about them
, before bringing it back to her. “Oh. I don’t give a damn about a bed, sweetheart,” he answered and then slammed his lips to hers.

Linna melted
. Sucking, grasping lips pulled hers awry, as he ravished her tongue with his. She helped. Then they were moving again. Each step pounding her against him. Torturing. Exciting.  

It got darker
. Linna didn’t open her eyes to verify it. She was incapable of absorbing anything except the burning sensation of his tongue and lips.

He went to his knees, slanting her forward and down onto
what felt like rough wool, his body straining within her locked legs, and his tongue a living entity. Then he lifted his head, breaking the kiss, but before she could respond, she heard the chemise tearing. Felt air. And then him. Linna erupted in ecstasy as he suckled.

Then he was sliding his mouth down the mound of their child, his hands holding onto her bosom
. His lips neared her apex. Closer. Nearer. He closed in on the place her mind wouldn’t allow.
He couldn’t! I can’t let him
....

Pleasure erupted, coursing over her skin, accompanied by her scream
. Cord’s breath, as he chuckled, made it even more intense. And then he was back, his eyes scorching and intense.

Linna
barely had time to catch her breath, before he was there. Filling her. Claiming and imprinting adoration onto every bit of her. She screamed again, but Cord captured the sound with his mouth. She was with him every lunge, every movement, every contortion, and she was in heaven the entire time. Oh. He knew exactly what love was. He just didn’t know how to admit it.

Linna had her arms and legs wrapped about him when he finally allowed
his release. She experienced every beat of his heart, every shudder he made, and the way his chest vibrated with his agonized-sounding cry. It was magic. Pure and perfect.

Cord’s
body lurched a final time, before he rolled onto his back, taking her with him. Linna winced at the crush of his weight on one ankle before she got it freed. She lifted her head and waited as his breaths calmed, although he was still lifting and lowering her with each one.

Something snorted directly above her head
. Linna jumped slightly. Cord barely registered movement. And then a large mare’s head gripped at the hay beside Cord’s head lifted another bite.

“We’re...in the stable?” she whispered.