Page 122 of Bride of Mist
Pulled under into the depths of desire.
In his embrace, she floated and swam and happily drowned.
She moved against him, delighting in his textures. The coarse stubble of his angled jaw against her cheek. The curl of his velvety locks around her fingers. The sleek muscle of his shoulder beneath her hand. The firm swelling against her belly.
He groaned as she pressed closer, and the sound awoke something primitive in her.
A sharp craving.
An intense need.
An undeniable imperative.
She deepened the kiss, opening his mouth with hers, letting her tongue swirl into his delicious recesses. His breath flowed into hers, warm and luscious and eager.
When his tongue whirled over hers in return, retreating and delving between her lips, his pulses were so evocative that she felt a white-hot current sear through her veins, jolting her to life with secret fire.
Gasping against his throat, she turned one hand to let it slide down his chest and over his abdomen. Seeking and finding the splendid bulge below his belt, she pressed her palm against him.
His response was half a grunt of victory and half a sigh of defeat.
But her gentle laugh of triumph quickly evolved into a helpless sob when he slid his fingers over her throbbing neck, descended to stroke the delicate flesh of her bosom, and slipped beneath her leine. His fingertips teased the top of her breast until she thought she would go mad with longing, and she arched toward his hand, aching with need.
With a low chuckle that made her ears hum, he brushed her nipple with his thumb, stealing her breath and sending sizzling sparks through her body.
Breaking the seal of their kiss, he moved his lips across her cheek and along her jaw, breathing flame upon her throat where her pulse raced.
She closed her eyes, collapsing against him as ecstasy washed over her like a powerful ocean wave.
Then she stiffened in alarm.
She wasn’t sure what alerted her.
A sixth sense?
Her warrior training?
A survival instinct?
Somehow, in the midst of a sea of sense-stealing rapture, Feiyan suddenly felt, by the prickling at the back of her neck, they were not alone.
Someone was watching them.
Even as she reveled in the heaven of Dougal’s hand fondling her breast and his lips burning a trail along her throat, she found the presence of mind to slip open the corner of one eye.
She only peeked for an instant. But that was all it took.
On the sand just beyond the iron grate, framed like a bright orange flower in the opening between the cave and the sea, stood Merraid. Wide-eyed and gape-jawed with shock and hurt and betrayal.
By the time Feiyan broke off the kiss to push away from Dougal and slipped the leine back up over her shoulder, it was too late.
Merraid had seen enough. She was already stumbling in abashed retreat. Blinking at Dougal in mortification. Turning as scarlet as a boiled crab.
Dougal was too busy frowning at Feiyan’s abrupt rejection to notice Merraid.
Thinking fast, Feiyan whispered to him, “Push me away.”
“What?”
