Page 26 of Captivated
Something was happening.
“The trees.” The sound of his own voice seemed odd and secretive in the shadowy grove. “I fell in love with them.”
She stopped walking to eye him curiously. “Did you?”
“I was up here on vacation last year. Wanted to get out of the heat. I couldn’t get enough of the trees.” He laid a hand on one, feeling the rough bark of a trunk that bent dramatically away. “I’d never been much of the nature type. I’d always lived in cities, or just outside them. But I knew I had to live somewhere where I couldlook out of my window and see these trees.”
“Sometimes we come back where we belong.” She began to walk again, her footsteps silent on the soft earth. “Some ancient cults worshiped trees like these.” She smiled. “I think it’s enough to love them, appreciate them for their age, their beauty, their tenacity. Here.” She stopped again and turned to him. “This is the center, the heart. The purest magic is always in the heart.”
He couldn’t have said why he understood, or why he believed. Perhaps it was the moon, or the moment. He knew only that he felt a stirring along the skin, a fluttering in his mind. And, from somewhere deep in memory, he knew he’d been here before. With her.
Lifting a hand, he touched her face, letting his fingertips trace from cheek to jaw. She didn’t move, not forward or away. She only continued to watch him. And wait.
“I don’t know if I like what’s happening to me,” he said quietly.
“What is happening to you?”
“You are.” Unable to resist, he lifted his other hand so that her face was framed, a captive of his tensed fingers. “I dream about you. Even in the middle of the day I dream about you. I can’t turn it off, or switch the scene around as I’d like. It just happens.”
She lifted a hand to his wrist, wanting to feel the good, strong beat of his pulse. “Is that so bad?”
“I don’t know. I’m real good at avoiding complications, Morgana. I don’t want that to change.”
“Then we’ll keep it simple.”
He wasn’t certain if she had moved, or if he had, but somehow she was in his arms, and his mouth was drinking from hers. No dream had ever been so stirring.
Her tongue toyed with his, tempting him to plunge deeper. She welcomed him with a moan that sizzled in his blood. At last he pleasured himself by tasting the long line of her throat, sliding his tongue over the pulse that hammered there, nibbling the sensitive flesh under her jaw, until he felt the first quick, helpless shudder pass through her. And then he was diving, more deeply, more desperately, when his mouth again met hers.
How could she have thought she had any choice, any control? What they were bringing to each other herewas as old as time, as fresh as spring.
If only it could be pleasure, nothing more, she thought weakly as sensations battered against her will. But even as her body throbbed with that pleasure, she knew it was much, much more.
Not once in her years as a woman had she given her heart. It had not been jealously guarded, because it had always been safe. But now, with the moon overhead, with the silent old trees as witnesses, she gave it to him.
Her arms tightened at the swift, silvery ache. His name tumbled from her lips. In that moment, she knew why she had needed to bring him there, to her most private place. Where could it be more fitting for her to lose her heart than here?
For another moment, she held him close, letting her body absorb what he could give her, wishing she could have honored her word and kept it simple.
But it was not to be simple now. Not for either of them. All she could do was take the time that was still leftand prepare them both.
When she would have drawn back, he pulled her in, taking her mouth again and again while images and sounds and needs whirled in his brain.
“Nash.” She turned her head to rub her cheek soothingly against his. “It can’t be now.”
Her quiet voice slipped through the roaring in his brain. He had an urge to drag her to the ground, take her then and there, prove that she was wrong. It had to be now. It would be now. The wave of violence stunned him. Appalled, he loosened his grip, realizing his fingers were digging into her flesh.
“I’m sorry.” He dropped his hands to his sides. “Did I hurt you?”
“No.” Touched, she brought his hand to her lips. “Of course not. Don’t worry.”
He damn well would worry. He’d never, never been anything but gentle with a woman. There were some who might say he could be careless with feelings, and if it was true he was sorry for it. But no one would ever have accused him of being careless physically.
Yet he had nearly pulled her to the ground and taken what he so desperately needed, without a thought to her acceptance or agreement.
Shaken, he jammed his hands into his pockets. “I was right, I don’t like what’s happening here. That’s the second time I’ve kissed you, and the second time I’ve felt like I had to. The same way I have to breathe or eat or sleep.”
She would have to tread carefully here. “Affection is just as necessary for survival.”
