Chapter Five
She’d run away from him, like a coward, Lucy thought later in anger mixed with regret. After his shocking words, she’d left his office in a flurry, without daring to look back. She’d been afraid he might be in pursuit. Like a predator that had already staked a claim on his prey.
He had not pursued her, though. Nor did he approach her or make more shocking statements in the days that came. He did nothing, and this was vexing. It was as if he was lying in wait for her, watching for her next move.
She should be afraid of him, she kept telling herself. He was her employer. And she was at his mercy in this strange country, with no friends or family to protect her. Oddly, however, she did not feel afraid of him. It was only with excitement that she thought of him. What she was really afraid of was herself.
She should never have come here. She should never have let her father drag her into this. But what choice had she had?
She eventually decided that it was better to face her employer. She would tell him his behavior was unacceptable and she would demand that he find her another position or at least give her references. It was the right thing to do. She would leave and this madness would be over soon. Somehow she would get a grip on her life. She would be sorry to leave Alexandra, but she would not put herself or the child in an intolerable situation.
She was vexed that he did not seem to wish for a conversation with her when she finally decided to approach him. He was, he told her in cheerful tones, going for a visit to the stables. He had a treat for his horse, which was a temperamental animal, quite unhappy and lonely to spend most of his time in the stables during the cold and ice of the Romanian winter.
Lucy did not like the way he was dismissing her. “What I have to tell you won’t take long,” she told him impulsively.
He had the audacity to grin. “Fine then. You can come along with me.”
Lucy opened her mouth to say that this was improper, but suddenly and inexplicably felt incensed by his next words.
“There’s no one there at this time. Are you afraid of coming with me?” he asked her, with more than a hint of challenge in his voice.
“I’ll come with you,” she found herself saying, and cursed herself for it.
Still, the words could not be unsaid. Gritting her teeth, she accompanied him to the stables.
On her guard, she waited for him to pet his horse and talk to him. He was ignoring her, she saw, gazing in vexation at the way in which he lavished all his attention on the animal that was munching an apple.
She studied Boyar Marcu through narrowed eyes. He was ignoring her, but he could not fool her. Although his back was turned to her, she could see he was tense and straight as an arrow. He was alert for her reaction.
“Your behavior toward me was unacceptable,” she told him flatly, without waiting for him to turn toward her.
He did not. Instead, he asked her insolently and lazily, “Don’t you like horses?” It was as if her dislike for the animals had been palpably apparent to him.
“No,” she answered tiredly. “Besides, they always seem afraid of me.”
“They’re not used to your scent,” he told her, as if it was the logical thing to say.
He suddenly faced her, fixing her with his green gaze. He walked away from the horse’s stall and straight to her, but stopped just a few inches away. If he’d thought he’d surprise her, he was sadly mistaken. She’d anticipated his reaction and looked at him calmly.
“Your behavior was unacceptable,” she repeated, not caring that he was, after all, her employer.
He grinned impudently. “What will you do about it?” he asked, as if he were a child daring her to do something dangerous.
“You’re taking advantage of your position,” she told him in exasperation.
It was, yet again, infuriating how calmly he managed to answer.
“No. I am not taking advantage of my position. If I were, I would already have you sprawled on your back, moaning, with my cock thrust deep between your thighs.”
He was offensive and crude, she thought, too dizzy with the scents around her to think. She did not, however, feel offended by his words. Instead they made her clamp her thighs tightly shut, as if she was afraid she might open them to welcome him there.
His effect on her was maddening. Intoxicating.
“So? What will you do about it?” he repeated patiently, like a beast of prey stalking a deer about to bolt.
He was vile. Infuriating. And he deserved to be punished for taking advantage of her. She clearly did not know what she was doing. She simply found herself closing the distance between them and entangling her arms around his neck. He deserved to be strangled, she thought dazedly. Instead, she found herself kissing him hard on the mouth.
She felt even more vexed when she found his lips unresponsive. She abruptly broke the kiss and studied him through narrowed eyes.
“You’re mocking me,” she told him.
He shook his head. His lips were red and still had the scent and trace of her own lips on them. “No. I’m trying hard to resist you.”
“Resist me?” she asked, already bereft of the last shred of reason. Why would he resist her?
“Because, if I were to respond right now, I think I might just devour you,” he told her.
He was, she saw, simmering with barely contained passion. He’d kept himself in check while she’d lost control. She’d make him lose control, she vowed.
Without thinking, she used her tongue to trace the seam of his lips. She did not know where this had come from, nor did she care. She had forgotten everything else but him and this moment.
He sighed deeply, his hot breath tantalizingly coming against her own skin.
“I suppose it can’t be helped,” he said softly, every word spoken against her lips and sending darts of ticklish sensation inside her.
It was then that he kissed her. Hungrily. As if he never intended to let her go. He used tongue and teeth that were bruising her lips, but she did not care. She realized it was something she had been fully prepared for. She relished it. She drank into him, just as he drank into her, feeling the warm heartbeat in his chest pressed against her, arrogantly taking pride in the arousal that she already felt nudging against her belly. He would claim her now, she realized with certainty. It was, of course, something that, against all reason, she wanted to happen now.
It vexed her that he was the one to break the kiss. It was as if he was still clinging to shreds of his self-control.
He gazed upon her with eyes that were liquid green. “So this is it,” he told her abruptly, as if he was astonished and at the same time relieved.
She looked at him, uncomprehending. She felt she didn’t have patience for any of his riddles. She just wanted him to claim her. Now.
She prepared to reclaim his lips if he didn’t plan on kissing her soon, but was suddenly halted by the sound of voices coming from outside the stables.
In panic that they were about to be discovered, she gazed up at him. He acted swiftly, breaking the embrace, taking hold of her hand and leading her to one of the empty stalls. He carefully closed the door behind them. Then he knelt, forcing her down right beside him. She understood he was making sure that they wouldn’t be seen. Still, the position had a strange intimacy that was almost as enticing as the kissing they’d shared.
“Mitru and Florica,” he told her, answering her unspoken question. They were actually hiding. Lucy felt ashamed of herself, but soon her shame was surpassed by curiosity. The sounds of a rapid argument in Romanian were heard—Mitru’s raised voice, accompanied by Florica’s pleading tones.
“What are they saying?” she whispered to Boyar Marcu, whose nearness was every bit as unsettling as it had been earlier.
He shook his head. “He’s angry with her. He’s caught her kissing another man,” he whispered back.
“Florica?” Lucy asked incredulously. It was really incomprehensible. She had seen the woman around Mitru and it seemed she loved him to distraction.
“What a silly girl,” Boyar Marcu muttered.
He fell silent then, as the argument seemed to go on and Mitru’s voice began to sound thunderous. Lucy began to fear for Florica’s safety.
“Maybe we should—” she started to suggest.
“Shh.” He halted her with a gesture.
The shouting subsided, replaced by sounds that Lucy found even more shocking. They were slaps on the bare flesh. Methodical slaps, which sounded quite stinging, because they were soon accompanied by female sobbing and then by wails.
“He’s beating her!” she said, suddenly resolved to open the door of the stall and stop the violence that was going on.
She was, however, promptly stopped by a pair of strong arms.
“Steady now,” he whispered, holding her tight and not allowing her to move one single inch.
“Stop him!” Lucy told him, ineffectually squirming. “You’re his employer. You must do something about this.”
“It’s their quarrel. Let them sort it out,” he told her calmly.
“But he’s beating her!” Lucy persisted.
He gave her a half smile. “Not quite.”
He pushed her gently toward a crack in the door which, Lucy soon discovered, made an excellent peephole.
The scene that she saw made her blush to the roots of her hair. Mitru had a red-faced Florica over his knee and was spanking her bare behind with grim determination. Lucy could not get a full glimpse of the punished bottom but, by the wails that could be heard and by the steadiness and efficiency with which the spanker alternated both cheeks, it seemed that it was not a trifling matter.
She averted her eyes, although she realized that she would have liked to keep watching with avid interest.
“You are blushing,” her employer whispered hotly in her ear, which made her even more aware of his nearness and of the improper scene they were witness to.
“You should stop this, he’s beating her,” she protested, but even in her own ears her voice sounded feeble and unconvincing.
“Hmmm, he is giving her quite a spanking, but no, I wouldn’t say he is beating her,” he said drily.
She would not meet his eyes. The sounds that could be heard from behind the door made her want to crawl as far away from him as possible. She felt intrigued and strangely aroused by the whole scene, and the presence of his warm solid body pressed against her own made her nether parts burn.
“You condone this,” she accused him. “You think he’s right to punish her.”
“Well, she did behave in a singularly foolish manner. And I don’t think you begin to understand just how foolish this girl was,” he told her, then shushed her when she wanted to protest.
“Listen,” he whispered. “It seems the punishment is over. It is time for soothing.”
Indeed, the wails had subsided, now replaced by soft sobs from Florica and firm but gentle words from Mitru. Then, after a while, nothing could be heard.
“Are they gone?” she whispered.
“I don’t think so,” he said softly.
And soon different kinds of sounds could be heard. Sighs and moans. Rapid breathing. Lips touching.
She could not resist. She peeped through the opening. And there they were, two lovers in the hay, the man holding the woman gently and...
She averted her eyes, utterly mortified, and heard the boyar chuckle softly.
“Afraid to watch?” he asked.
“I have no right to watch,” she told him, eyes downcast.
“That’s true. We should leave the lovers their privacy.” Then he added, with the same wolfish grin he’d had before he’d kissed her, “And we should have ours.”
Imitating her earlier gesture, he traced the seam of her lips with his tongue, then kissed her teasingly. His teeth grazed and nibbled her lips, sending darts of tingling sensation in her whole body, and especially between her legs, where she keenly felt a void that needed to be filled.
Lewd pictures came into her mind. Not only of his hard cock impaling her and of his tongue lapping the musky essence between her legs, but also of his hand placing playful but stinging spanks on her upturned bare bottom. She felt disgusted with herself. However, she also felt his body pressed against her so keenly that she could not let go, and she felt his hardness against her belly.
It was as if his essence was already inside her, filling her. Yet again, she inhaled a scent that was unmistakably his—soap and tobacco, very discernably all male, cock and unspent seed, blood that was hot and burning for her. Burning for release. Everything else seemed to disappear around her and a terrible hunger took hold of her again.
It was then that she realized that she had been kissing him so hungrily that she had bitten into his lower lip. She drew away, her eyes remorsefully falling on the drop of blood she had drawn.
“I am sorry,” she whispered.
“You could at least lick it better,” he told her, a mischievous glint in his green eyes.
God help her, she did, reveling in the red metallic flavor of his blood. And the taste took her there where she sometimes went in her dreams. A primeval forest where she could mate, where there’d be only a rustle of leaves, the wind in her ears and the sweet scent of prey.
She shook her head, afraid of the feeling, and came back to herself.
From beyond the door, sounds of passionate lovemaking could be heard. Flesh against flesh. Whispered endearments and moaning. A man inside a woman, pumping hard within her, filling an ache that had grown between her legs. An ache that Lucy herself wanted filled.
She closed her eyes. Her father had already told her she was a vile and depraved creature. No wonder she had just given in to her baser impulses.
She drew away from Ioan in shame, her back pressed against the door, lowering her head in a defeated gesture. She would not look at him and he took her chin in his hand, forcing her to look at him. His eyes met hers.
“You want this as much as I do,” he whispered, and there was no question in his voice.
Mutely, she nodded, feeling miserable.
He kissed her again, this time hard, all the lingering gentleness gone. Her back was already against the door and she found herself lifted against it, her legs instinctively encircling his waist, her hands around his neck. Belatedly, she realized he was hoisting her skirts and slipping a hand inside her pantaloons. God, she was already so wet. His finger found her gushing for him and stroked her tantalizingly. She could no longer wait. She wanted him inside her.
She opened her mouth to tell him so, but he again silenced her with his kiss. His finger had already found the nub of flesh which made her go even wilder. He was stroking it with gentle, circular motions and soon, everything disappeared around them in a frenzy of light. She was again in her primeval forest, the sun shining on her body, rubbing her sated body against that of her mate.
It was probably much later that she came to herself.
“We can come out. They’re gone,” he told her, waking her from her dream.
The stables were now empty, with no sign of Florica and Mitru, only an imprint of bodies in the hay where they had lain.
“She made love to him, although he’d just spanked her,” she said, still uncomfortable with the scene she’d just witnessed.
He gave her an amused grin. “Of course. It was, after all, what she wanted.”
“What?”
“She’d been playing with fire, flirting with another man and kissing him. And, as I heard her tell Mitru earlier, it had been all to make him jealous. You see, Mitru is a serious, proper young man and he would not take liberties with her before the wedding.”
She looked at him, uncomprehending. He sighed. “Most people here, the peasant folk, don’t think it’s in any way wrong to consummate their marriage if they’ve been promised to one another, even if the wedding hasn’t taken place. Since everybody knows they are to wed, there’s no harm in lovemaking. A promise is a promise, after all. Unless, of course, one of them proves unfaithful. Keeping honor is important—and in their eyes, what can be condoned for men cannot be condoned for women.”
“Of course,” she muttered ironically, recalling that things were not so very different in England. People waved off men’s sexual indiscretions while women who happened to make them would ruin their lives. Still, there was one thing she didn’t understand.
“But if everyone here believes it isn’t wrong for engaged people to be intimate before marriage, why didn’t Mitru and Florica...?”
She trailed off, realizing she was still uncomfortable with everything that had been going on, which was probably ridiculous, since she still felt her whole being tingling from what Ioan had done to her.
“Make love,” he supplied with a slight smile, then sighed. “Mitru comes from a more traditional family, older and higher up in the village hierarchy, and his upbringing was stricter. Besides, Mitru is Mitru. If he really believes the honorable thing is to wait until after marriage, then he’ll obstinately cling to his honor.”
“So when Florica kissed another, she risked losing Mitru for good,” Lucy said, beginning to understand the ramifications of the situation.
“She risked a great deal. Because she was seen kissing another man, in the others’ eyes she is already a ruined woman. Mitru should, according to them, cast her off. Either that or beat her black and blue, in order to prove that, from now on, he can keep her in line.”
She shuddered, but he went on, “Mitru is a good man, and he knows she really loves him. And he loves her, although she has been foolish enough to flaunt herself, just to get his attention.”
Lucy shook her head, thinking it right to defend her new friend. “Well, maybe not foolish. Maybe desperate enough for his attention to show him that she would risk shunning or violence just to be in his arms.”
He grinned. “Well, she got her wish. A thorough tumble in the hay and a stinging spanking to boot.”
“He spanked her hard,” Lucy said, blushing at the memory of what she’d heard and seen.
“As I told you, he was being kind. He had to punish her. And she knew it too well. I heard her asking him to do it. Honor demanded it.”
“Couldn’t they have just kissed and made up, forgoing the punishment?”
Ioan shook his head. “Word has already got out. Mitru’s family is already incensed, and so are Florica’s parents. So Mitru had to make sure she was chastised. If her parents see she’s already been well spanked for her transgression by her intended, they’ll be far more lenient when they punish her. Because, make no mistake, they will punish her for her behavior.”
“Poor Florica...but couldn’t Mitru just stand by her? Just defend her?” Lucy asked with a shudder.
Again, he shook his head. “He did what he had to do. Florica’s parents will be relieved that he’s forgiven her. On the other hand, his own family will not be too pleased when they understand she got off lightly...and people will whisper behind his back as it is—they’re probably already saying that he should have taken a horsewhip to her in full view of everyone.”
“That is monstrous! Do people do that to their wives here? Do you condone it?” Lucy asked in horror.
“I don’t condone abuse, and I most certainly would have put a stop to a beating, if it had taken place in full view. I cannot, however, entirely change the way these people choose to behave in their own homes, nor do I think it is my place to do so. They are harsh. The men are harsh. And the women accept it, because their lives are harsh and they have their own codes they live by. They resent my interference. All I can hope is that their children will grow up to see things differently.”
“Yet you think Mitru was right to spank his fiancée,” Lucy told him, feeling rather vexed with him.
“Yes, I think it was the only course open to him under the circumstances. He is a good man and I know for certain he will never harm her or strike her in anger.”
He gave her a penetrating look, then added rather wickedly, “Besides, things did get solved to their mutual satisfaction.”
She blushed again, deeply.
“You are blushing,” he said, stating the obvious, grinning while he looked at her lowering lashes. She would not meet his eyes.
“Why, Miss Cross, I do really think you were not as repelled by the scene as you let on to be,” he told her cruelly. He went on as she pretended to be staring at some fixed point, far away from him. “I bet you’re wondering right now what it feels like to be taken over your lover’s knee and being on the receiving end of a stinging spanking on the bare bottom.”
She gasped. “I would never...” she started saying, then, realizing that she was being hypocritical, clamped her mouth shut.
Still, she refused to meet his eyes. He chuckled. “I could oblige you one day, you know, when we’re more adjusted to one another. But only as a treat. And only if you are very, very good...” He trailed off softly.
She cursed him mentally, as she was beginning to feel the flaming sensation in the nether parts that he had, only minutes ago, been able to soothe with his finger. She still felt very vexed with herself and with the way she was behaving. It was wrong. What she wanted him to do to her was wrong. And what he’d just done to her was wrong, and immoral. She was his employee and had a duty to his child.
“You and I,” she said in a tired voice. “This is wrong and it has to stop. I think I should resign my position.”
“What about Alexandra? She’s already grown fond of you and will be sorry to see you go,” he told her, in a serious tone this time.
“She is a wonderful child,” Lucy said passionately. “But she will do well with any teacher. She does not need me after all—she does not need a woman of low morals as her teacher.”
He shrugged. “Fine. If you think that what we did is immoral, we could make it moral, so that it fits your proper English sensibilities.”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s not my proper English sensibilities and you know it. You and I—this is wrong.”
“No,” he corrected her. “You and I—this is right. And we can also make it proper. We’ll marry in order to set your mind at ease.”
He was decidedly mocking her. She did not dignify this with a comment, but determinedly strode to the door.
“I’ll send for a civil servant from city hall before Christmas comes, to make it all legal,” he called after her.
She stopped in her tracks. No, he was not mocking her. He was simply insane.
“And we’ll have a small ceremony here. I will not marry you in a church, though, so that you know. But I’ll have you as my lawful wife,” he added.
She had heard enough. “You are mad!” she told him, understanding that she had to leave this place as soon as possible.
He shrugged again. “There are few people who can call themselves really sane. Still, I’ll marry you, if you’ll have me.”
As she was staring at him in horror, he went on, unperturbed, “I am rich, you know. And you are already fond of my child—I can see it. It might seem dreary here in winter, but spring and summer are really beautiful. And besides, we can always go to Paris or London for extended visits.”
As she didn’t make a single gesture, he continued, “You needn’t fear this is an empty promise. I’m prepared to wait for the wedding night until we’re legally wed. That way you’ll know this is bona fide.”
It was then that she really lost her temper. She closed the distance between them in three strides and slapped him. Hard.
He rubbed his jaw, but, instead of rebuking her, he laughed. “That’s an interesting answer,” he told her.
“You arrogant bastard!” she told him thickly.
Again he shrugged in that infuriating gesture. “I can’t understand what you’re so upset about,” he told her in an innocent voice.
“I can’t believe I’m still here listening to this...” she muttered, more to herself than to anyone else in particular.
“But of course you’re listening to this. It’s a reasonable solution.” He said it with utmost confidence, and Lucy struggled to keep the last shreds of her temper. Her hand was itching to slap him again.
“I don’t want to marry you,” she told him flatly.
“And I don’t particularly want to marry you either, but I want to fuck you, and you want it too. And we’re both unmarried. I hope you know that once I’ve had you, I won’t ever be able to let you go. So, marriage does seem like the best solution.”
He was mad. There was no question about it. Why she was listening to this insane talk was beyond her comprehension.
He was right about one thing, though. She did want him inside her so very much. So much that it drove her crazy.
She sighed. “There’s another solution—I must go. You know this is the best course.”
“Do you have anyplace better to go?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “That’s none of your business,” she told him.
“No place to go then. So you see, you can marry me,” he concluded logically.
Again she shook her head. “Let me go, please!” she told him, but in her own ears, her own voice sounded feeble.
“But I can’t let you go. And I think you won’t be able to bring yourself to leave,” he told her soothingly, as if he were stating the obvious.
“You’re mad!” she repeated, although his words were making strange sense to her.
“No, draga mea,” he told her, and the words he added did sound like an endearment to her. “I am in heat. And so are you. So it’s natural that neither of us is thinking quite clearly. But marriage does seem like an acceptable solution.”
Then he kissed her again and she did not protest. Of course, she was not thinking clearly. And she was behaving like a bitch panting for her mate. She should feel ashamed of herself. She should stop this madness. Yet she knew she could not.
“I’ll sleep with you,” she told him, breaking the kiss but resigning herself to her fate. “But then I’ll have to leave.”
“Not good enough,” he told her. “I can’t let you go. And I won’t. Ever.”
The words were spoken in calm tones, yet they had an odd finality to them. She was probably deranged herself, because she took them as fact. As if she knew that he could never let her go under the circumstances and, strangely, that she herself would never want to leave after he’d bedded her.
She could, of course, just remain here and be his mistress. She was insane enough to want nothing more than that. However, that would lead to an unfair, dishonest situation, which might harm a child she’d already grown fond of. But, truly, marriage was an insane solution in itself. She did not know him. She did not know him at all.
“I don’t think I even like you,” she told him in earnest.
He laughed. “For that which we both have in mind, it does not matter very much. And besides, there have been marriages that have started with less.”
She did not like where this was leading. It was as if she were already agreeing to this. “People will say I’m a scheming little nobody who’s married you for your money.”
Yet again, he shrugged, unperturbed.
“What if we’re both going to regret this? We do not know each other at all,” she said pleadingly, as if she was debating within herself.
He pulled her in his arms, roughly, not leaving room for argument or for sanity.
“You know, woman,” he told her, and in her ears his voice sounded as if it were somewhere between a low menacing growl and a seductive purr. “I think you do protest too much. And I don’t really care, because I can always shut you up with a kiss.”
He did. Although, to her regret, he didn’t do more than that, but left her burning and unsatisfied, wickedly reminding her that he wanted to do the moral thing and bed her after he’d wedded her. He was arrogant and insufferable and, obviously, in far better control of the situation than she was. She resented him as much as she resented herself. For all of it.
It seemed absurd, but within herself she strangely knew she simply had no other choice. Running away was simply not an option.
* * *
If he’d had doubts before, they had melted away when he’d kissed her. The kiss had been just as deep as in his dreams, but even more than that. There had been a true taste to it that had sung to his blood. A taste seeping with energy. Very much like the tree of life.
He’d have to marry her quickly so she wouldn’t change her mind and run away from him. It was the Englishness in her, he thought in vexation. It was that veneer of propriety and the stiff education she’d received. It was that veneer that prevented her from fully acknowledging things that to him were now obvious.
“I know it’s sudden,” he told his daughter while they were gazing together at the snowflakes twirling outside. “But, you see, this has to happen. And it’d better happen now.”
“I know,” Alexandra answered in her calm voice.
Guilt started gnawing at him. This was a hasty decision, and he should have prepared his child better. For all of it. However, some things could not be helped. They were what they were and he knew he would not ever be able to change them. Not even for the sake of his child.
“I like Lucy,” he heard her say.
She was reassuring him because it was in her nature to do so. She was always protective of those she loved, even if she was only ten. Sometimes he got the distinct impression that she was much more frightened of it all than she allowed him to see.
He kissed the top of her head. “I know you do. I would not have asked her to marry me, if I’d thought you did not.”
“I know,” Alexandra told him. “She’s very English, isn’t she?” she added, however, echoing his own thoughts.
He laughed. “Yes, in a way. But you see, sometimes it’s hard to see people for what they really are, when they come from a different place. I guess we seem very Wallachian to her, don’t we?”
Alexandra shrugged. “I suppose. But still...” She wanted to add something more, but paused.
“What’s troubling you, Andra?” he asked immediately, using her pet name. Sometimes he had the feeling that she did not share things with him simply because she did not want him to worry.
“It’s just...well, it’s just that she doesn’t act as if she really knew,” his daughter finally told him.
He sighed. She was stating the obvious. And it was a thing that had been troubling him as well. But he hadn’t been able yet to find a satisfactory way of solving this. As usual, he was hoping that things would eventually find their own way of settling.
“I know what you mean,” he told Alexandra. “It’s complicated. You see—I guess a part of her already knows. But then...well, there’s obviously the other part that doesn’t.”
“But shouldn’t we tell her, Papa?”
He’d thought about it. He’d thought about a serious conversation with Lucy. But he was afraid that what he had to say would scare her off. And, it might be selfish of him, but it was not a risk that he was willing to take.
“I don’t know,” he said earnestly.
But one thing was plain, he thought later, after he’d told his daughter good night. This was what mattered most. He’d felt it when he’d kissed Lucy, the hot thread that ran through his blood and made him what he truly was. For those brief moments, the restlessness and pain he had so long been accustomed to had simply disappeared. They’d been drowned by her nearness.
And he sensed that she felt the same way about him. The same intensity which eclipsed the world around them. The rest...well, maybe it was for the best to let her figure things out for herself. She needed to understand things on her own terms.
Release. This was what his marriage to her was going to bring. But not only that. It would also bring forever. And, although he’d spoken it to her, it was a word that he was somewhat scared of. Forever was a treacherous word. He knew too well. He had been married before.