Judith E. French by Shawnee Moon Page B

the rape would keep her from wanting this ever again. But it hadn’t.
    He kissed the corners of her mouth, her throat, and her eyelids. She laughed, and he found her mouth again. She knew she was lost when the tip of his tongue parted her lips.
    Suddenly, Sterling was no longer the man who had murdered her father or stolen her away from her homeland. He was only a desirable man, and they were together in a warm bed on a late summer morning.
    It had been so long since anyone had held her this way, so long since she’d tasted the sweet nectar of a lover’s kisses or felt his hands on her naked body. She closed her eyes and gave herself over to the pleasure, letting herself savor the velvet heat of his tongue and the response of her own love-starved body.
    Cailin was vaguely conscious of putting her arms around his neck, of meeting kiss for kiss... of letting him push her back against the feather tick ... of feeling the length of his hard body pressing against hers.
    His black hair fell forward to brush the bare skin above her shift. “It tickles,” she whispered.
    He laughed and pushed the hair away, kissing the spot with his lips while his hand gently cupped her breast.
    She arched her back and sighed, remembering the joy of a man’s mouth on her nipples... Remembering ... One of the dragoons had bitten her. Her right breast still bore a scar from his teeth. But Sterling wouldn’t hurt her. She knew he wouldn’t, and she needed his lips, his mouth to wipe away the memories of horror. “Kiss me there, please,” she whispered.
    “You’re a bold piece,” he teased. But he did as she asked, and it was all right. She felt her nipple tighten and swell. She felt a heat coil in the pit of her belly.
    Tears sprang to her eyes ... tears of joy. What those men had done to her was over and done with. She didn’t have to carry the shame for the rest of her life.
    Outside the open window, a bird trilled. A warm breeze carried the scent of the ocean to the bright bedchamber. Cailin closed her eyes and blocked out the ugliness and the pain. Sterling’s head lay against her breast, and she felt safe.
    “Such a sweet bud,” he said.
    Somehow, his free hand had found her bare thigh and was sliding her linen shift higher. She moved restlessly as a cold sliver of unease darted from the darkness of her mind.
    It’s Sterling, she told herself. It’s all right if he touches me. I want him to. She tried to concentrate on the rubbing of thin cloth against her throbbing nipples.
    “Am I so repulsive a husband?”
    She caught his chin and raised it so that she could kiss him full on the mouth. When they were kissing, she didn’t think about the soldiers.
    “Ye talk too much,” she said when they broke to take a breath. “If I did want a husband, ’twould never be one who cawed like a raven from dawn till dark.”
    He was an excellent kisser.
    Cailin was no inexperienced lass. She’d been kissed by boys and men, some sober and others drunk as lairds. Sterling was a master of the art. His breath was clean, his teeth sound, and his manners proper.
    Kissing Sterling was like leaping off a bluff into the sunlit waters of Loch Shin. At first contact there was a shock, but as the kiss deepened, the mystery and the sense of abandon grew. His kiss took in more than her lips; it swept over her body like a wind-whipped tide. And like staying under water too long, Sterling’s kiss made her lose track of reason.
    He nuzzled her breast. “You’re soft in all the right places, wife. I want you.” His voice deepened to a low husky rumble. “I want you, Cailin, more than I wanted my first woman... more than I’ve ever wanted any woman.”
    “I’m nay your wife,” she protested, but only a little, because he’d pushed her shift down to expose her round, rosy breast.
    She moaned as he flicked his tongue over her nipple. “Sweet,” he whispered, and gently drew her into his mouth.
    Good. It felt so good. She didn’t care if she hated