The Wagered Wench (6 page)

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He swept his tunic down from his shoulder so it slapped against the bulk of his thigh. “You are not the only one inconvenienced here, woman.”

“What?”

She’d thought the discussion over with, but now he came back. “It was never my intention to marry. If I had not walked into that tavern yesterday and stepped in to save your father, I would not be faced now with this trouble.”

“Then why do you stay?” she cried.

“Because I see this place needs me. Your father needs me. If I leave now,” he added, “what will your father do?”

“We will go on as before.”

He shook his head. “No. Your father will find another opponent and next time he may not be so lucky. He could find a man unscrupulous, who will steal from him and give nothing in return. A man who will not protect this place, or you, but leave all in ruins.”

Elsinora did not want to accept it, but he spoke so calmly. There was no closing her ears to his warnings, no denying the possibility. She might want to imagine the world was managed differently, but it was not. Women had no voice, no matter how loudly she could shout.

“So,” he added, swinging his tunic against his thigh, “the decision to stay and take you for my wife, is not one I make lightly.”

“Haven’t I put you off yet?” she chirped, hoping he wouldn’t see her lips tremble, her fingers clasped nervously in the folds of her gown.

“Once done it cannot be changed and I am stuck with you.”

“
Stuck
with me?”

For a moment she thought he was blushing, but perhaps it was just the heat of his anger rolling off his skin.

He looked at the ground by his feet, his voice falling to a mumble, “Because once I take a wife there is no other woman in my bed but her.” He paused. Finally he raised his eyelashes again to look at her. “You, my lady, must keep me satisfied in bed. That will be your most important duty as my wife.”

She stared.

“
If
I decide to honor you with the post,” he added. “If I decide you are worthy of my cock.”

And it occurred to Elsinora that the man was fighting hard to keep a straight face.

Chapter Five

Her mouth, she realized belatedly, flapped wide open. Pulling herself together, she exclaimed, “You try to tell me you would be a faithful husband content with one woman? Do I look like a fool?”

“I do not
try
telling you anything, woman. I tell.”

She folded her arms. “I know about men and their need to sow seed widely.”

“What means this?” He scowled now, the faint smile gone. He moved closer to where she stood. “Speak plain woman and not in riddles.”

He wanted plain words? She’d give him plain. “Women do not want a man as often as a man wants a woman. Men are beasts who enjoy fucking more than women do. That is why men can never be satisfied with one partner. A sensible wife encourages her husband to take mistresses, so that she may have peace from his crude fumblings and the constant toil of childbirth.”

As she spoke he advanced again, each one of her angry words apparently drawing him in rather than chasing him away as she’d hoped. With every forward step he took, Elsinora backed up. His eyes were hot, hard. “And what gives you all this knowledge of men and fucking? Your father assured me you are a maid. Is this not so?” He stared at her crossly, branding her again with his mark of ownership. “Tell me now if you are not.”

Aha! This would be her chance to chase him off, but before she could speak, he added in a calmer tone, “Not that it matters. I should like to be warned, however.”

She stumbled back. He followed again.

Don’t think of the way his body fits inside those breeches.
Look at his scar instead and remember how ugly he is, how he frightened you last night when he loomed out of the dark.

He raised his hand and captured her chin, his thumb pressed to her lips, the ring on his finger cold against her jaw. She tried to pull away but found herself trapped by a low stone wall. On the other side of it there was the dung heap. The Norman widened his stance, penning her in against the wall. His thumb pressed down on her lower lip and then his mouth claimed hers.

She raised her knee between his legs but he was ready for her. Showing off his warrior’s reflexes he dropped his tunic and blocked her thigh with his free hand, pushing it down and then sliding immediately between her legs. Her gown was in his way, but he fondled her through the material, trying to work an insistent finger through the weave. She gasped, and as her mouth opened he thrust his tongue into her mouth, taking it roughly. Elsinora tasted his breakfast—ale and something else—mint leaves? He must have been down to the herb garden early this morning and plucked mint for his breath. Few men she knew would bother.

“I’ll see for myself if you are virgin,” he growled into her lips.

She was too shocked to fight. Yes, that must be the reason why she went limp and let him kiss her again. Let him lift her gown aside and push his hand between her legs to touch her quinny. The stone wall pressed into her lower back, but he did not care apparently about her discomfort. When the callused pad of his finger slipped between her labia, she almost forgot about it too.

This was a secluded corner of the yard and wreathed in shadow as the morning sun, not yet reaching its highest point, moved around behind the buildings. Here no one came unless to heave a barrow of dung after cleaning out the barns and stables, but that would not be done again until evening. Spring plowing had just begun in the fields however, and the manure would occasionally be fetched by cart, so there remained a small chance of being disturbed. Her heart kept a scattered pace, her gaze shifting to the corner of the barn over his shoulder, watching just in case.

He stroked her daisy, working it with a gentle fingertip. Again his lips covered hers, kissing her as she’d never been kissed, not even by Stryker Bloodaxe. His tongue wound itself around hers, tugging and insistent. He moved closer, his strong muscular thighs holding hers apart while his hand explored her pussy. She imagined her mother’s voice, scolding and harsh as it was most often, telling her to stop him.

Elsinora what are you doing? Down on your knees, this instant, and repent girl. Repent!

She perused his scarred cheek, her conscience trying to remind her of his evil. But a spark of wanton desire and curiosity flamed inside her loins, too hot to be ignored. “Oh, very well then. See for yourself if I am a maid. Have your proof. If you must.”

At once his finger moved further and she tensed against the intrusion. She stared at the muscle flexing in his shoulder and felt the finger at the end of that arm penetrating her another short distance until he felt her hymen. Finally he pronounced, “No man has been here.”

He leaned back a little, but kept his hand on her sex, his finger in her damp cleft. “I will not take your virgin blood unless you are my wife. And then you will be my only woman, from that moment on, as I told you once already.”

“Of course!” She turned her face away. “You’ll never look at another pair of titties”

“I might look. I might even admire, but I won’t touch. Not once I have a lawful wife. This I swear.”

“I don’t know why you bother telling me this,” she groaned, as he worked his finger lightly and teasingly over her blossoming flower. “I don’t care what you do with your cock, Norman.” She wanted to run away, but her legs felt useless. The heat he conjured between her thighs was fierce, scalding, mesmerizing. His entire hand possessed her now, the heel of his palm pressed into her pubic mound. Slowly and carefully he added a second finger to the first.

He leaned over her again, watching her lips as if they were a small treat held out and he a mastiff fixated on that promise. “Remember my name?” he growled. “Coeur du Loup. Heart of the Wolf.”

Elsinora had not known what his name meant, but she shrugged, trying to ignore the fingertips sliding in and out of her now, slick with the wetness of her passionate, shameful arousal. His touch was far more tender than the stream and yet the sensations he lured out of her were much deeper, much hotter. She gasped, “So?”

“Wolves mate for life.”

Elsinora managed, somehow to breathe, even with him so close and with her pussy twitching, hovering on the brink of climax, partially filled, emptied and filled again by his probing fingers. Each time the hardened pads of his fingers scraped over the teased heart of her daisy, she shuddered, her lips parting, catching another mouthful of his masculine scent.

Drowning, she sought for an argument in the watery depths of her heated despair and came up for air again, empty-handed.

“That is why it is important that when I marry, I know I shall be well pleasured. Tended to.” He pressed his fingers back inside her quinny, massaging her so intently and expertly that her world spun and she was glad of the wall at her back for without it she would have crumpled. “As I tend you now.”

The waves that had begun as ripples, now flooded her valley and she grasped his bare shoulders, her hips jerking. Her belly slammed into his taut groin, rubbing on the rigid mound of his cock, needing his fingers deeper.

“Be careful, Elzinora,” he whispered, a nuance of surprise in his voice and something raw, lusty. “I don’t want to break your—”

She moaned. Her mind went foggy, desire taking over, obscuring her clear view of all else. A hot wave washed through her blood, vibrated deep in her sex. Her muscles tightened on his fingers, pulling on them.

He swore softly against her cheek and began moving his hand faster. Exhaling in a low squeal, Elsinora climaxed as she never had before. Never. Had not thought it possible. And she wanted it again. Wanted more. Spasms arcing inside her, she swung her hips against him, her fingers digging into his wide shoulder muscle.

“Fuck,” he muttered shakily. “I think I just broke your maidenhead.”

Although she’d felt no pain—only glorious pleasure—when she glanced downward, blood had indeed dripped to her inner thigh. Astonished, Elsinora stared at those scarlet drops quivering on her pale skin. Two of his thick fingers were inside her all the way to the knuckle. He had claimed her and she was too wracked with delight to stop him. The need had been held captive inside her too long. A tiny, thin, scared voice inside her head warned Elsinora to push him away. She should scream for help and then run to her prayers. Instead she allowed his fingers to resume a slow, sensual fucking motion. Again she focused on the tendons in his shoulder, the hard-worked muscles of his arm, driving those wicked fingers in and out of her. She reached her hands higher, around his neck, pulling him closer. Her buttocks rubbed against the rough stone wall and he nudged her thighs further apart with one knee.

She could be ashamed later, she decided. Elsinora had too many naughty yearnings, too much curiosity, to put an end to this.

“I wish I could mount that pussy, here and now.” His voice was hoarse in her ear, his stubble brushing her cheek. “I’m so hungry for it, I can taste your sex in the back of my throat.”

She thought of animals she’d watched mating in that same yard and she was feverish with need, weak with it. He moved his groin against her thigh and she felt his manhood straining in his breeches.

“You’ll take my damn fingers off,” he whispered throatily as he licked her cheek, his body pressing her to the wall. “Now I know how this will feel around my cock, my lady Elzinora, I—” He paused, breathing hard. “Are you slipping the reins again, wild filly?”

She didn’t need to answer for he must have felt the aftershock pulsing through her narrow valley in the next breath.

“Your body is not so cold as your manners,” he murmured wryly, lips brushing her brow. With a masterful hand he cupped her sex, squeezing, exerting pressure that intensified her pleasure and took her to new heights of keening bliss. It was almost as if he tested her, experimented.

For a long moment she was lost in a glorious cloud, floating high above that yard and away from all her troubles. Then his teeth nibbled at the pulse in her neck and that tender bite woke her. She drifted back to earth. His chest was pushed up against her breasts, his hand still cupped between her thighs. With trembling hands she grabbed his wrist and forced his hand away from her at last.

“Now you made my choice for me.” He wiped his fingers on his chest, leaving a bright slash of her maiden blood across the firm muscle. “You impaled yourself upon me, my Lady Elzinora. You are now my mate. I shall wear this blood and let it dry there like a badge of honor.”

“It’s Elsinora,” she muttered, knowing her cheeks were flushed. She was appalled, still shaking inside. All she could think to criticize was the way he spoke her name?

“Elzinora.”

“No…listen…it’s
Els
inora.” Suddenly it was the most important thing in the world that he get it right.

“By all means.” She chuckled dourly, startled that she could find any humor in this situation. “See what that gets you.”

“It had better get me what I want, wench, or else.”

“I’m not afeared of you, Norman.”