Teresa Medeiros - [FairyTale 02] by The Bride, the Beast Page A

forcefully against Gwendolyn’s leg she said, “Given his girth, I’m surprised I didn’t mistake him for a mastiff.”
    The Dragon unfolded one of his arms from her waist, only to trail the knuckles of his free hand along the curve of her collarbone. She felt a shiver of dark anticipation.
    “I’m gratified to learn that it was Toby who frightened you,” he murmured in her ear. “I feared it was me you sought to escape.”
    “Could you blame me if I had? “
    “No,” he said lightly, “but I would have anyway.”
    Gwendolyn had forgotten she was wearing the prim nightcap until he gave it a gentle tug. Her hair came spilling around her shoulders in a silken cascade. As he buried his face in it, Gwendolyn closed her eyes against a rush of longing.
    “If you’ll let me down, sir, I’ll promise not to peek at your face,” she whispered. “If it’s some sort of battle scar or tragic birthmark you seek to hide from my eyes, I shall respect your desire for privacy. And I can assure you that I’m a woman of my word.”
    “You almost make me wish I were a man of mine,” he muttered, tenderly raking away a handful of hair to expose her nape.
    Gwendolyn might have been able to bear it if he’d simply touched her with his fingers. But it was his lips he laid against that vulnerable swath of skin. They lingered there, moist and warm, caressing her with melting sweetness. Gwendolyn would never have dreamed that being devoured by a dragon could be so unbearably delicious. It tempted her to offer up every morsel of her flesh for his pleasure.
    As his mouth drifted away from her nape to graze the column of her throat, her eyes fluttered shut and her head fell back in unspoken surrender.
    Cupping her jaw in his hand with an irresistible combination of tenderness and strength, the Dragon tilted her face just enough to allow him to touch his mouth to hers.
    Gwendolyn might yet be a virgin, but she no longer possessed a maiden’s mouth. The Dragon claimed it for his own, breaching the softness of her lips with a swirling tongue of flame. It licked to life a thousand kindred flickers along every inch of her flesh. Her breasts tingled and swelled. He tightened his arm around her waist, molding his hips to her backside.
    Even if he had dared to turn her in his arms, she didn’t think she could have opened her eyes. Her lids seemed weighted by an enchantment more powerful than any spell or curse. It wasn’t so much the magic of his kiss that bewitched her, but the mundane—the rough, tender texture of him; the sweet, salty flavor of him. When her tongue flicked out to taste him in turn, he groaned deep in his throat and drew her even closer.
    “I say, old fellow, am I too late to rescue the damsel? “ Tupper’s jovial voice came from the window, breaking over them like a dash of cold water.
    “No,” the Dragon said grimly, as he reached up and jerked off the cravat hanging loose around Tupper’s neck. “You’re just in time.”
    After Tupper had finished repairing the window grate in Gwendolyn’s chamber, he emerged from the castle’s shadows to find the Dragon pacing the courtyard where they had first found her. Despite the morning sunlight streaming over the crumbling walls, his friend’s countenance was as black as midnight. Smoke streamed from his finely hewn nostrils as he took a long drag on the cheroot tucked in the corner of his mouth.
    Tupper gave the tip of his mustache a nervous tug. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your little tryst. I pray you’ll forgive my lack of discretion.”
    The Dragon snatched the cheroot out of his mouth.
“Your
lack of discretion? It’s not
your
lack of discretion that troubles me—it’s mine. What must she think of me? Every time I find myself alone with her, I fall upon her like the beast she thinks I am. Have I been so long without a woman in my bed that I have to prey upon the first innocent who has the misfortune to cross my path? “ He flung the cheroot away and