Moonlight Surrender (Moonlight Book 3) (20 page)

The smile on his mouth mocked her. “You could not with me.”

Her smug look was meant to silence him. “You are on the floor, are you not?”

The next moment Duncan’s arm darted out and he struck her on the calves. He caught her unawares, and Beth shrieked in surprise as she tumbled down onto him.

She landed so that her body covered his much as a blanket does a horse. Duncan was quick to catch her hands so she could not rise.

“And now, so are you.” His laugh was lusty as it filled the air. “See how well we fit together, Beth?”

She struggled against him, but it only served to arouse him more. And her as well.

When his tongue touched but the merest hollow of her throat, it made her ache for him once again.

With a little cry, Beth brought her mouth down to Duncan’s.

The kiss, of her own volition, was the beginning of her undoing. The room and all within it seemed to spin into a deep, rimless darkness.

She gave herself up to the sensation for a moment, savoring, delighting, mourning for what was not to be. She swore to herself that the control, the reins to this ride, were still in her hands.

To prove it, she pulled back from him with all her might. Her weight was balanced on her palms, which were spread out on the floor. Her body hovered over his, her breasts, full and ripe, straining to fall free. She was aware that his arms were around her. Still, she could get up, if she wanted to.

But did she want to?

Her breath was not easy to catch. She forced it to steady within her breast before she spoke.

His eyes were fastened to the tempting cleavage as it rose and fell before him.

“I was not questioning the fit, Duncan, merely the propriety of it.”

He knew better than to laugh at her words. Propriety
could go to bloody hell. Duncan cupped his hand at the back of her head so that she would not draw too far away from him.

‘Then do not question anything at all, sweet Beth. For I am long past questions and words. Feel, Beth.” The word rippled seductively along her bare throat. “Here.” He drew a tiny mark across her breast, where her heart beat wildly. The tip of his finger singed her. “Feel here.”

The very sound of the words brought a cry from her. More than anything in the world, she wanted this man.

Now.

“This changes nothing,” she warned, as her eminent capitulation shimmered before her.

“Oh, no,” he contradicted, his eyes on hers. “This changes everything.”

The next moment, the debate dissolved in smoke as
the last of her will deserted her. With a cry of surrender,
Beth descended into the fires that were waiting for her.

The clothes were cumbersome. He was desperate to have her free of them. Duncan burned for all of her, for every taste, every look. More than anything, he wanted to satisfy his curiosity if the goddess he had dreamed of that first night truly existed or if she was just a worshipful creation of his mind.

As his mouth reduced her to the purest form of pas
sion, he undid the laces at her back with hands that were
well suited to their task. Bridling his impatience, he tugged the unwanted material from her shoulders and slid it down hips that were ripe for a man’s hands.

He thought himself in heaven, just as he had that night.

Beth moved slightly as she realized that the material
was leaving her body. She had no idea that he was re
moving her dress until it was gone.

For a moment, her eyes held his. “You have skill at this.”

“Purely a beginner’s luck,” he murmured against her mouth. The taste he found there excited him. The wine within Sin-Jin’s cellar paled in comparison.

Her fingers spread upon his open white shirt, she
looked at him, undecided as to whether to be insulted or
not. “What kind of a fool do you take me for?”

He was hungry for another taste, not words. “No fool at all, Beth. Merely my salvation.”

The words echoed from his mouth into hers as he kissed her once more.

The words were pretty, but she would not let them cloud her head. It would be her undoing entirely if she did. Beth knew that what was to happen now between them Duncan had done many times before. It was only for her that the mystery existed.

Only for her that the excitement pulsed.

Pushing her uncertainties aside, Beth placed herself in
Duncan’s hands and let him lead her to a land she wanted to enter.

Her desire grew, becoming boundless. The fire within her grew to incredible portions, like a bonfire struck within the meadow that the winds suddenly whipped out of control.

She felt his hands hot upon her fevered skin, felt him tug away her chemise and the pantaloons she wore, felt his touch as it skimmed and explored and caressed her nude, pulsating body.

The touch of his hand was as gentle as it was urgent.

His hands were everywhere, claiming her, making her
yearn, creating a woman she did not recognize.

She groaned as she felt Duncan’s lips at her breast, suckling there like the child she had delivered yesterday.

And yet not like the child at all.

She had no idea that a man could do this to a woman.

Eager, her hands wild, she tugged on Duncan’s shirt.
Duncan swallowed the pleased laugh that echoed in his
throat. It was just as he had thought, just as he had hoped. Beneath the cool words beat the heart of a wildcat.

And for this moment, the wildcat was his.

He took her hands in his and rose, bringing her to her feet as well. She was as nude now as she had been that first night, that night he half thought he created her in his delirium.

His gaze swept over her, warming her blood. “You are more beautiful than you were that first night.”

Even now, she blushed. “I thought you were asleep.”

“And I thought myself in heaven.” He stripped his shirt from his body and threw it aside. He was eager to
feel her flesh against his, eager to savor every tiny shred that he could, every tiny bit she had to offer. He almost
laughed at himself. He was behaving as if this was his first time as well.

Perhaps, in a very strange way, it was.

Chapter Twenty

She did not know what madness overtook her. She only knew that it was madness, and she was glad of it.

With hesitant, questing fingers, she dipped her hands down to his britches. They formed a barrier she wished to breech.

“You are dressed and I am not,” she protested. Heat
seemed to flow from her fingertips, warming his very skin, though she touched but the cloth between. “ ’Tis not fair, Duncan.”

Fair? No it was not fair, he thought. It was not fair
that the hunter became the hunted. And yet he had, and
gladly so, if it meant having her this way.

“I shall always be fair to you, Beth. Always.”

The promise, delivered with a smile, held more truth than she could ever have hoped for, far more than she would have believed. It frightened him to feel the depth of emotions that were coursing through his veins like the force of a river swollen with the rain from a deluge. He had always been in control of all his feelings, even that night at his father’s manor. Never once had there been a need to struggle in order to maintain a tight rein.

There was need now.

For in his heart, in his very soul, he felt emotions straining to break free. Emotions that would shackle him more tightly than any iron chain forged in the bowels of the Tower of London.

He wanted her, forever. Exactly the way she was this moment.

What would she say if she knew?

Rather than aid her, Duncan let Beth undo his britches herself. He sucked in his breath as her long, tapering fingers slid along his hips, urging the fabric down. And by the same stroke, urging him up.

The britches fell to the floor and he kicked them aside carelessly, leaving them scattered with the rest of the garments they’d taken from each other.

He burned to plunge himself into her, to feel that hot burst within his loins which would allow him to renew himself.

But rather than race to the end he knew was waiting for him, Duncan took her hand and softly kissed the palm. He felt her shiver, not from the cold but from the heat, and his heart was made glad.

It would be worth the trouble and the wait. She would be worth the trouble.

“Come, Beth, let me show you what it is like.”

Fear had entered her heart.

Fear of going forward. Fear that he would cease now,
before she reached journey’s end. She was torn, confused, and needy beyond her wildest expectations.

But as his mouth touched hers, as his body pressed
against her in all the points that God had created to join
them eternally, and they fell together to the bed, all doubts fled from her mind. No thought was left, save
that she wanted to follow to where this man led, not two
steps behind, or even one, but at his side.

When he touched her, his palms gliding along her sleek body, she groaned, but held fast to that one thought, that one goal. She would make him hers as much as he made her his.

Determined, Beth matched him touch for touch, stroke for stroke, passion for passion, until the leader became the follower, the jailer the prisoner.

And then the tables were turned again and they began
from the beginning.

Duncan had long ago lost count of the women he had
had. In their time, they had brought him endless pleasure. He could not now remember a one. Indeed, there might as well have been none, for all the impression they had left upon his mind and soul. Their very memory was burnt away in the trail this woman forged now.

The embers this small chit of a woman stirred were
something new, something completely beyond the scope
of his imagination.

She humbled him, made him want to fall to his knees in worship and thanksgiving. He feasted upon the banquet she offered him. And with each new secret he imparted to her, she showed him one in kind.

It was as if he had lived all these summers with a stranger and did not know himself.

They tumbled about the bed, dragging sheets and bedclothes in their wake until all was a tangled mess, kicked off to one corner.

She was passion, she was fire, she was beyond his
wildest hopes and dreams. She left him weak and em
powered him as well.

Beth could not begin to describe what was happening to her. There were no words that were fitting. She felt ablaze with passion, with wants, with cravings. The more he touched her, the more she wanted to be touched. The more he kissed her, the more she sought out his mouth.

And all the while, she felt as if she was rushing to some end.

When Duncan knew that he could hold himself back no more, he rolled her onto her back, his body ripe and poised over her.

The time had come.

He looked into her eyes, smoky with passion, and yet
still so innocent. A moment from now, she would no longer be innocent. He imprinted her face, as she was this moment, upon his heart. She was forever his, no matter who loved her in years hence.

His weight on his elbows, Duncan framed her face for a moment with his hands.

“This will hurt, Beth,” he whispered, wishing it could be otherwise, wishing he could be her first and not have the fact outlined in pain, “and for that I am truly sorry.”

She was lost in his eyes, she thought, drowning in
that green sea, just as she had once feared she would be.
Except that there was no fear now. She had never felt as
sure of herself before as she did now. A smile lifted the
corners of her mouth.

“It will hurt me more if you do not do it.”

As of that moment, Duncan was completely lost.

Murmuring endearments to her, making promises he
knew she did not hear, Duncan entered the citadel in tri
umph and remained to become a prisoner himself.

Beth stiffened as the pain he promised came. But it
faded, eaten away by the raging fire that consumed her.
The raging fire ignited the moment Duncan began to move within her.

Afraid to be left behind, Beth began to move with him, and their bodies melded in a hymn that the morning doves sang at sunrise.

The hymn became a wild sea chanty, its tempo increasing like a storm at sea. Finally, they rode the crest of the highest wave together. Beth cried out his name, the sound muffled against his shoulder.

Spent, Duncan tumbled to earth once more, dazed,
disoriented and fearful that he had been, at the end, too
rough with her.

He felt the rise and fall of her soft breasts beneath him as they rubbed tantalizingly along his flesh. Even
now, exhausted, she stirred him. He felt himself quicken within her. What manner of woman was she, who could raise him up so high so quickly and do it all with no de
sign on her part?

With his last shred of energy, Duncan forced himself up upon his elbows and looked at her.

“Beth?”

If she tried, she was certain that she need but reach out her hand and capture a fistful of stars. He made her feel as if she could do anything.

“I am still here,” she murmured, her eyes shut, the wonder pulsating within her.

Duncan moved slightly and a smile curved his mouth as the soft impression of her body rippled against him. “Yes, that much I know. But—“

Beth’s eyes opened. Was he going to say something to spoil all this for her? Would there be words to wash away the happiness she felt at this very moment?

“There is no ‘but.’ “ Beth laid her finger to his lips to
silence him. “I want no words to pass between us, Dun
can.”

Humor entered his eyes as it curved his mouth. “Ever?” he murmured beneath her finger.

She felt the heat of his breath and it excited her. “No,” she laughed, dropping her hand. “Only for the moment.”

He waited a moment as she requested. His amusement faded, to be replaced with something far more tender. “Forgive me, but I must ask. Did it hurt?”