The Irish Warrior (14 page)

“Why is it so dark?” Senna mumbled under her breath as she tripped over yet another tree root. But darkness wasn't the problem. It was her body.

Finian had healed her fingers, but the rest of her felt as if it had undergone a beating. Her hand was at the small of her back, cradling it as they scrambled up yet another hill. Her hips felt like they'd been stretched on a rack, or at least what she imagined such a torture would feel like. Her thighs actually burned, as if hot coals were ablaze under her skin. And her back…best not even to think of it.

“I believe I am somewhat the worse for wear,” she said.

This time Finian replied, which he had not been doing for the last hour of hiking. Still, though, he was exceedingly curt, which he had been ever since the river.

“Ye'll be better off by tomorrow,” he said. Curtly. “Three days is the charm. Yer body will get used to this manner of traveling.”

“Ha.” She flung knotted curls over her shoulder, spitting a tendril of hair out of her mouth.

He glanced over his shoulder. “Ye did fine back there.”

Still curt, but communicative. She did not take her eyes off the treacherous, root-strewn ground below. “So did you. I had no notion you could mimic a man from Shropshire.”

“I don't often find the need.”

“No,” she agreed ruefully. “I expect not.”

He grunted. Senna scowled. Back to that, were they?

They walked for a long time, and Senna soon found that ignoring her painful muscles was one thing, but ignoring her growling stomach was quite another. By sunset her belly was reprimanding her at regular intervals.

She hadn't filched half enough food for them. She'd planned a quick trip to Dublin, not this trek across the marchlands. Cheese and dried meat were good, but they were almost gone, and she was hungry for real food, and above all, fresh meat.

He turned back regularly to watch for her welfare. Once he pulled her up the other side of a steep stream embankment, another time pushed her away from a deep crevasse she was about to blunder into.

“Sooth, woman,” he growled from a few feet ahead after one such incident. “Can ye not keep your eyes open?”

“Sooth, woman,”
She mimicked his impatient tone, then stumbled and stubbed her toe. She hopped around on one foot, muttering.

He didn't look back and he didn't stop walking, but he said over his shoulder, “'Tis yer penalty for being contrary.”

She glared at him. “'Tis, is it?”

“Aye.”

Too weary to summon the strength for a good inhalation, she certainly could not come up with a good, biting retort. She yanked a tree branch out of her way then let it go. It slapped her bent backside as she walked under. She rubbed her nose and blundered on, each step a leaden effort, eyeing his back with an evil glare.

Long dark hair swung down past his shoulders. His chin was up, his shoulders back, and his gaze moved in a constant sweep of the land. The plated muscles of his thighs worked tirelessly, eating up the miles between them and a modicum of safety. He hopped over a downed tree trunk and, pushing lightly on the balls of his feet, leapt the width of a small creek. Landing without a sound in the thick, fecund earth on the far side, he turned and extended a hand for her.

Accursed Irish.

She glared at his upright figure across the creek. Her spine was curved in an endless, creaking bend. Her feet were screaming, her thighs burning, and if he did anything else agile or energetic, she would cuff him. Simply reach out and smack him on the back of the head.

She crawled over the greening stump, her nose pressed into the moss. Disdaining his help, she leapt over the creek, tripped as she took off, and landed smack in the center of the babbling stream, wetting herself to the knee.

Cursed
Irish.

He said nothing as she slogged up beside him, squishing and squeaking. Slanting evening light sliced between the tree branches and lit up the contours of his impassive face, but as soon as she opened her mouth, he shook his head and turned away.

Some time later, he finally halted them. “We'll camp here for a meal,” he announced curtly.

All in all, he was being very curt, which she considered highly unfair. She was the rejected party. Curtness was hers.

She sat down beside the pit as he gathered wood. Sleep would solve a few of her problems. For a little while.

But when Finian sat down nearby, even sleep became a lost cause. “Let me see yer fingers,” he said. Again, curtly. He extended his hand.

She retracted hers, holding it to her chest. “They are hale.”

He regarded her with a disheartening mixture of disgust and perceptiveness. “Senna—”

“Grand.”

Had her teeth just gritted?

“What was that?” he said, looking around.

She glanced over her shoulder, as if seeking the source of the strange, creaking noise. “Perhaps another bird. Some are ground dwelling, build their nests in rocks and such.”

His gaze swung back around slowly. He pinned her with a long look, then got to his feet. “I'll have us some food before we hike out tonight.”

“Tonight?” Her voice curved up high with incredulity. Horror. “We walk more this night?”

He paused in the act of bending to sweep up the bow he'd set on the ground. “Ye had a different plan?”

“Sleep?”

He cradled the smooth curving wood of the bow in hand. “Not ours yet. Just a few more hours.” He turned away.

“Where are you going?”

“Hunting.” He started out of the clearing, into the woods beyond.

“Wait. I can help,” she called, furious to be so expendable, to be treated in such an offhand manner. To be so…left behind.

He drew to a halt, his wide shoulders almost, if she was seeing correctly, slumping. He turned around slowly. “What did ye say?”

“I can help.” She gestured toward his bow. “Hunt.”

His glittering eyes held hers. “Is that so?” he said, in such a low, feral tone it didn't sound like a question at all. It didn't even sound like he was the least bit pleased. “Then by all means, come.”

He extended his hand in a mockery of politeness, allowing her to go first.

She swept haughtily by. “I've no notion what this mood is about, Finian, but I do wish you'd scratch whatever itch is causing it, for your mood is most foul.”

Before she could finish the L in
foul,
he had her arm locked in his grip and her body backed up against a tree.

“Scratch my itch, is it?” His eyes glittered dangerously, and Senna recalled he was a warrior first.

Then he spoke again, and in the onrush of deep, tempting fear, she understood he was a man first and last. A prime specimen of raw masculinity, virile, potent, hunting.

“
Ye're
my itch, Senna. I want to scratch
ye.
No notion?” He stepped closer, his fingers gripping her arm like a vise. “Shall I give ye a notion? Shall I give ye some small inking of what I want to do to ye?”

And like that, she was panting, her head spinning. One of his hands was on her arm, the other fisted against the tree over her head. In the dimming light, he was all solid, dark outline, his body taut, looming over her, closing in on her, dark, male energy about to consume.

He bent close to her ear. “Shall I tell ye, Senna, what I want?”

She whimpered something. Was it
yes
?
Please
? Whatever it was, he mustn't stop. She would die from the want of him.

“I want to run my hands up your side, take ye in my mouth. I'll start wherever ye want. I'll kneel down before yer body and worship ye.”

Her knees weakened. He caught her and his hand moved just as he'd said, up her ribs, so tightly she felt he was lashing her with rope. His powerful thighs bunched and he pressed forward.

“I want to taste ye. Can I do that, Senna? Will ye let me do that?”

“Oh, Jésu,” she whispered.

“Can I slide my hand up yer leg? Can I feel how wet ye are? Can I be inside ye? I want to be inside ye. Hard.” His voice was like dark, perfect fury. He pushed his hand across her belly. “Do ye want me inside ye?”

“Aye,”
she said in a hot whisper. She threw her head back and banged the tree. His thighs were hot on hers, then his erection pressed against her belly. She pushed back urgently, recklessly, one wrist hooked around his neck, her body moving of its own accord, her breath coming out in hard, sharp pants.

“Do ye have a notion now, Senna?” he growled, his voice thumped by the rocking of her hips.

“Aye.”

“Do ye want more?”

“Aye.”

He slid his hands under her buttocks and lifted her, so she was sitting on his hips, her thighs parted, dangling over his.

Trapped between the tree and his hot, sculpted body, she went senseless. Dimly, she heard herself whimper. The long, hard length of him pushed up between them, sliding over everything that throbbed in her body. Her hips pumped forward and he shoved into her, so every inch of them touched from hips to chest. Then he growled in her ear, “Do not move.”

She went still. Every toned muscle of his body was rigid against hers. He shuddered slightly, and they stood absolutely still for half a minute. All she could hear was his ragged breath and the blood thudding inside her skull. Then he bent his head, his mouth by her ear, his words a dark, sensual threat. “I'll watch ye come, lass.”

Rampant shuddering chills jammed down her body as his mouth claimed hers in a deep and savage kiss. She returned every plunge of his tongue with one of her own, her fingers twisting into his hair. Her tongue, her teeth, her lips, he claimed everything, relentless in his pursuit, drawing senseless gasps and whimpers from her body until he finally came up for air, and dragged his lips along her neck and shoulder, leaving behind an amoral trail of heat.

He yanked down the collar of her tunic, revealing the tops of her breasts. She leaned her shoulders back to allow him access, her fingers in his hair, inviting him to do more, much more.

His eyes held hers, level and unreadable, as he pushed his hand up under her tunic, over her hot skin. Then his thumb brushed roughly over her breast. She closed her eyes, arching up. With a muted curse, he shoved her tunic up as high as he could, bent slightly to the side, and closed his hot mouth over her nipple.

Her breath came exploding out. He locked his hands around her hips, his mouth claiming her breast with confident, damaging skill. Dark hair fell down over his face as he licked her and, gripping her hips with both hands now, holding her immobilized, he tilted his hips, sliding his erection in a long, slow skate against her leggings and the shuddering, quivering, questing flesh beneath.

Her world exploded. Hot, rippling undulations rode through her muscles, fast and greedy. Her head dropped forward, then back, as she cried out, stunned. Nothing like the explosive power of this man had ever entered her life before. Nothing so potent, nothing so vital, not in her fettered life.

When she finally stopped shuddering, he lowered her feet to the ground. But he didn't step away, and he didn't let go. He just gave her a moment to gather herself, without allowing her to crumple into a boneless heap on the pine needles and dirt. How chivalrous.

His body was still taut with restraint. His breathing was still ragged, his muscles gilded with sweat, his eyes hard and merciless, which he'd never been before, so she was really rather concerned to find both those things now directed at her.

She pushed away. He stepped back. She stumbled only once, over nothing, then righted herself and gave her tunic hem a sharp tug down.

The world looked much the same as it had a few minutes ago. How peculiar.

Had it even taken minutes? she wondered helplessly. Or had he done that to her in mere seconds? It felt like he'd simply breathed on her and she'd come apart for him.

“Wait by the fire pit,” he said curtly. She was dearly weary of curtness.

If I take off my clothes and let you have me, will you smile at me again?
is what she wanted to say, which was so pathetic she almost hated herself for it. How weak she'd become in the face of Finian.

“I'll not wait by the fire,” she retorted, keeping her eyes slightly averted, her chin slightly aloft. The latter helped to remind her to maintain at least the semblance of dignity. “I'll be eating some of that game, so I'll help bring it down. I told you before, I was taught to use a weapon.”

His darkness regarded her. She could feel it. “Ye also told me ye were no good at it.”

She almost laughed. “I'm not good at so many things, Finian, I cannot let that stop me anymore.” She turned on her heel and walked into the forest. His measured footfalls followed behind.

“In any event, I said I was no good with the
bow,
” she added, clarifying.

He pointed over her head to the right, where the sunsetting light coming down through the trees was a bit brighter. A clearing must be nearby. He looked down at her. “Meaning?”

“Meaning,” she said, turning to look in his eyes, which she had not done since he made her world explode into the hot, perfect waves of pleasure still shuddering inside her, “I am fairly skilled with a blade.”

He paused. “How do ye get close enough?”

“I don't.” He stood with his hands at his side, bow light in hand, his eyes unwavering on hers. “I throw it,” she said, and turned away.

“Senna.”

She stopped but didn't turn.

“I'm sorry.”

Oh, sweet Mother. He must have seen the hurt in her eyes. He was addressing it. Could she be more shamed? Perhaps she should just paint the words in her blood, to show how exposed she was. How on earth had that happened? In a matter of days. For shame. For shame, for grief, and the love of God, what had happened to her?

She nodded, her back still to him, her turn to be curt. There was a small squirrel in the tree before her.