Page 51 of Tusk Love

He arched a brow at Guinevere. She pointedly removed her right boot and shook the pebble out of it before just as pointedly slipping the boot back on. Then she simply sat there, refusing to budge.

Oskar took his sweet time tethering the horses. When he finally went over to the log, he crossed his arms and studied Guinevere with an impassive expression. She scowled, staring up the length of him—atthe sinewy forearms and the wide chest, the stubble-dusted jaw that she longed to press her lips to, the white tusks gleaming in the muted autumn light.

“I’m usually the one who’s in a mood, not you,” he remarked. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m sick of this forest,” she grumped.

“Well, sitting here isn’t going to get us out of it any faster.”

“I’m tired.”

“I know,” he said, not without a trace of sympathy. “We’ll nip back onto the Amber Road once we’re close to the Wuyun Gates. Then we’ll be able to ride again.”

“And when isthatever going to happen, pray?” She knew that she was being unreasonable and churlish, but for some reason she couldn’t stop. “For all I know, you are leading us in circles—this is not a smirking matter!”

“Sorry,” Oskar said, still smirking, not sounding sorry at all. “It’s just…You’d been doing so well all this time that I almost forgot you’re a spoiled city princess. But I definitely remember now.”

Guinevere shot to her feet and launched into a rant that had been days in the making, wagging an admonishing finger under his nose. “First of all, Oskar, when a lady is in a temper, she must be soothed with sweet words,notinsulted beyond belief! And where do you get off, insulting me when this is allyourfault in the first place, for being so—”

He stepped into her space and pressed one hand into the small of her back, gathering her close as he ducked his head. The rest of her litany faded into oblivion when his lips found her neck and sucked a bruise into the delicate skin, so quickly and fiercely that her knees almost gave out.

“This, ah, isn’t a kissing matter, either,” she managed to rasp, sinking her fingers into the slopes of his shoulders for balance.

“It isn’t.” His horrid, clever mouth worked on another bruise higher up. “But kissing is a much better use of our time.”

“We aren’t evenactuallykissing,” she complained.

His sudden laughter was as deep and golden as his eyes. He gave herchin a brief peck before nudging it into position with his thumb and index finger. “You,” he breathed out against her lips, “are so much work, sweetheart. So why is it that I’m having the time of my life?”

And he kissed her, sweet and slow, and she heard herself sigh as she kissed him back. He stroked her hopelessly tangled hair, and she cradled his face in her palms, her thumbs tracing its dear contours, running along tapered ears and curves of ivory. He hummed in pleasure and, emboldened, she nipped playfully at his plush bottom lip. The kiss turned heated, all tongues and urgency, and then he was walking forward and she was walking back, their mouths still connected, and soon his body had caged her in against a tree the same way he’d once pinned her to the door in that little room in Zadash.

More greedy kisses, more hungry touches, the hardness of him unmistakable on her stomach. His large fingers tugged at her bodice, baring her breasts to the cool woodland air. A fresh surge of desire spiked through her as he covered each one with his palms, squeezing, his hips rocking insistently.

“We can stop,” he panted. “We don’t have to do this here.”

“Don’t youdarestop,” she said as imperiously as she could manage. As imperiously as anyone could sound with their breasts hanging out of their dress. It worked, because he didn’t argue with her any further.

After a long and lovely, delightful while, she let out a whine of protest when his lips drew back and his hands fell away, but those lips darted a quick kiss to her forehead, and those hands spun her around, coaxing her into a position wherein she was bracing her arms against the tree trunk.

“What—?” Leaves crunched behind her. She peeked over her shoulder to see him on his knees amidst the grass and the roots. His black hair fell in disheveled waves, his pupils blown wide with lust. How thrilling it was to be able to reduce a man to this. To make his hands tremble against her legs as he lifted up her skirt and pulled her underwear down.

And then he was spreading her thighs and looking at—ather.

“Oh,” Guinevere groaned softly, hiding her face in the fold of her arm, feeling ever so shy. But apparently not shyenough,because shewas sort of—wiggling—toward him, rather than denying him access. Aside from putting her life on the line several times, the journey south had also unearthed hidden depths of trollopery within her. She probably should have minded a bit more.

“You’re just as pretty between your legs as you are everywhere else.” Oskar’s voice was gravelly with wonder. His hot breath fanned against her intimate place, and she squirmed, a bead of moisture dripping out of her and down the inside of one thigh. “So pink and glistening,” he continued in that deep rumble that was sending goosebumps along her spine. “Like…like rose petals. Covered in morning dew.”

He abruptly fell silent. She couldfeelhis embarrassment, suffusing the air. Despite herself, she giggled. “Did you take poetry lessons from Rodregg, by any chance?”

Oskar pinched her bottom in retribution. Guinevere gasped, and then his tongue was licking a long stripe over her entrance, and shemoaned.

It felt like nothing she had ever experienced before. Like her entire being was afloat in the tide of some dark heaven. Oskar lapped at her long and deep, his wicked tongue drowning her in waves of pleasure with each velvety caress. Guinevere threw back her head with a strangled cry, her fingers clawing at the rough bark of the tree trunk, which was the only thing anchoring her to the ground. She writhed into his mouth, her buttocks resting against the crescents of his tusks as his lips pulsed and his tongue stroked and finally,finallytouched the secret pearl and swirled over it, again and again until her toes were curling and she was screaming, her mind a whirlwind of autumn leaves.

It was the kind of orgasm that could make a girl go blind. Guinevere had yet to recover from it when Oskar wrapped her hair around one hand and gave a gentle tug, urging her head back toward him until their lips met in a sweeping, utterly filthy kiss. She tasted herself on his tongue. She heard her own muffled whimper as the knuckles of his free hand brushed against her left nipple, teasing and compulsive all at once.

When he released her, she sagged against the tree trunk, caught in a strange halfway state between relaxed and excited for what wouldcome next. She listened to his ragged breaths, to the sound of him fumbling with his trousers, to the cries of distant birds. At the corner of her eye, Pudding and Vindicator were grazing, oblivious to the debauchery only a few feet away.

At least, Guineverehopedthat they were oblivious.

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