Fire Raven by Patricia McAllister Page B

always the chance she will turn on him and render both he and his measly ship afloat.”
    “Yea, I know it. There is something more to this, I fear — something evil,” Kat said. She clutched the front of his doublet as if he might save her from drowning, as well. Gently, Morgan pried her hands free and held them in his grasp.
    “Listen to me. You are starting to remember the accident. I vow, it will come back to you, whether you want it to or not. You will be frightened, you may be beyond terror at some point. Yet you must always come to me. I want you to promise me … Kate, Kat, my precious cariad . Come to me.”
    “Aye,” she whispered, relieved. “Yea, Morgan, I will.”

Chapter Seven
     
    K AT’S LIPS PARTED, EVER so slightly. She tilted her head back in an obvious invitation to a kiss. With aching tenderness, Morgan touched his mouth to hers. He felt her sag with utter trust and relief against him. Her breasts pressed against his doublet, violet wool and forest-green velvet the only barriers between them.
    Sweet. So sweet. Morgan’s mind whirled with emotions, agony chief among them. Jesu, she looked ripe for loving. He claimed her mouth with rising urgency, lowering them both into a grassy pool speckled with wildflowers. Her hands molded his face as they kissed. Morgan forgot the bane of his face, forgot all but the piercing waves of pleasure slamming over him.
    When he raised his lips from hers, her eyes were slitted in cat-like fashion against the bright light
    “Oh, my love,” she whispered. There was awe and great joy in her voice. “I never imagined —”
    “Nor I,” Morgan said, gazing with hunger upon Kat’s serene face, wanting to memorize forever how she looked at this moment. He knew it was all he would ever have. His hand moved along her shoulder, slid down to her hip, and nestled comfortably in the curves nature had provided.
    “Morgan,” she murmured. “Kiss me again.”
    It was both a demand and a plea. He decided if a single day must last him a lifetime, he might as well make the most of this one.
    “With pleasure, cariad .” She was no longer just his lost seagull; she was his beloved, as well. His mouth slanted down upon hers, and passion swiftly rose again, so powerfully that he was helpless against its onslaught.
    Morgan’s fingers trembled as he unhooked Kat’s bodice. A sheer lawn camisole hardly concealed her breasts from his gaze. If ever woman was perfection, she was. He ducked his head to capture a rosy nipple through the material and worried it with his teeth. Kat gasped, arched up against him with the newly found pleasure. Her fingers threaded through his hair as she urged him onward with hungry little cries.
    “Aye!” Her tone was urgent, pleading. “Love me, Morgan.”
    He had every intention of doing so. From shattering grief to pure ecstasy, they both might fly as swift and true as Ironbreaker, now. Morgan eased down the lacy straps of the camisole, freeing her breasts to his admiring gaze. They were lovely, flawless, as was the rest of her. He painted them with his tongue. With his teeth, he drew upon the nipples until they were hard as rubies and twice as red and throbbed as insistently as his own maleness.
    Kat shifted restlessly against him, drawing him up to her lips again. “Oh, Morgan,” she murmured. Her half-closed eyes never seemed more seductive nor intense than they were at this moment. “I must tell you something. I lo — ”
    “Ssh, cariad .” Morgan cut off her confession with a swift, emphatic kiss. “Not now. I’ll not see you tumbled quick as a country wench in a haystack. Come, let me help you right your clothing. I’ll set out the repast Ailis made for us. I find salt air does increase the appetite, after all.”
    Surprised, Kat thought Morgan’s abrupt departure from lovemaking must be due to propriety rather than conscience. She imagined he would have some explaining to do, indeed, if one of his serfs stumbled across the mighty