Forbidden by Sophia Johnson

every portion of his body had touched
hers, she had no image of him. Had he not imprisoned her hands and
she had felt him with them, he would not startle her so now. How
came a monk to be so strong, so hardened? Did they not idle the day
away in prayers?
    This man looked every inch the warrior
knight, from his massive shoulders to... Saints! She was cold no
longer. Surely, her blush covered her from head to toe? If it had
not before, it did now that he pulled the sheet from her fingers.
It rustled to the floor.
    Why was he silent? What she was staring at
with her eyes finally registered in her brain. His body had strange
scars, for they curved from his sides inward. What caused such
heavy scarring? He shifted, bringing her thoughts back to him.
    He again raked his fingers through the hair
above his forehead. It did not help.
    “Yer instinct led ye to protect yer belly,
Catalin. I note it as an instinct of a breeding woman.”
    Her eyes followed where he looked. A torrent
of melted snow could not have made her colder. She had thought
grief had kept her woman’s time away. It had before. In truth, fear
had nagged at her. She should have known.
    Her breasts were fuller, her nipples a
slightly deeper hue. She raised her left arm to cover them. Her
right went over her belly. She had ever been rounded, had felt like
a plump goose. Her belly did not sink in like a slender woman’s
would. Both arms curled around herself, protecting her body should
he beat her.
    “Get back into bed. I’m not going to harm
you.”
    She scrambled to sit back on the bed and
clutched the sheet again. He shoved her down flat, then rounded the
bed and went over to the basin and pitcher of water on a corner
table. The candles he had brought to the bedside table lit his back
to her view when he walked to his chest to hunt around in it.
    Blessed Mary! His flesh looked as if some
strange creature had burrowed beneath his skin, leaving thin,
raised tunnels that crisscrossed each other. Her stomach heaved.
She realized why the scars were so heavy. For truth, the mud had
been nigh impossible to clean from his torn flesh. How had he not
died? Surely, he had suffered long, hovering between life and
death. Thinking on the man who had done this to his son, she felt a
roiling hate for Chief Broccin of Raptor Castle.
    “I need yer help, Catalin.”
    Ranald sat in the center of the bed. He
bunched the sheets under his spread thighs. She blinked and shut
her eyes.
    “Ye canna help me with yer eyes shut,
woman.”
    She opened them, stared. For the first time
she saw a man’s sex nested amongst the hair of his groin.
    Where before his shaft had felt long and hard
as pewter, now it appeared soft and boneless. What had happened to
it? It rested atop two large, slightly hairy, vein-streaked
ballocks, strange looking things that they were.
    Oh God. He gripped a dirk! He meant to kill
her. She scooted back against the head of the bed, slamming into
it.
    “What ails ye?” His head popped up.
    The candlelight behind him threw his face in
shadows. He looked wicked. Frightening, with his mask hiding so
much of him.
    She gurgled and nodded at the dirk.
    “Dinna be a dolt. ‘Tis for me.”
    “You? You would kill yourself for my sin?”
She grasped her throat, about to gather breath for a hearty
screech.
    “Quiet. I dinna want to cut too deep.”
    He shook his head and huffed, then bent his
right leg up to lay it back on the sheet, spreading it so he could
reach an area at the edge of the hair nestled there. He laid open a
slit no longer than to the first knuckle of her little finger.
Blood welled. He did the same to his other groin.
    “Come. Straddle me.” He twisted at the waist
to toss the blade on the table. He spread his legs wide and
beckoned her.
    She sat there, mute as a babe, not
understanding what he wanted.
    “Hurry, afore the bleeding stops.”
    She didn’t budge. He grasped her waist and
dragged her to his lap then placed her legs around him. Once