Page 38 of The Pirate Lord
He broke off when he realized that the women were staring at him with fearful eyes. Sara was twisting his words to make him look like a monster. And succeeding, too, confound her.
“Out!” he roared at the women. “All of you! Get out now! I wish to speak to Miss Willis alone!”
He didn’t have to say it twice. All that the women needed was his command to make them flee the hold in a whisper of skirts. Sara gazed after them as the hold emptied. “Come back! He can’t make you leave! He has no right?—”
“Sorry, miss,” the last woman muttered. Then she ducked her head and shooed her children toward the ladder.
When they were gone, she whirled on him, eyes flashing. “How dare you walk in here and just dismiss my pupils, you … you bully!”
The fact that her accusation had a ring of truth didn’t make it any easier for him to stomach. In a few strides, he was in front of her. “I’m tired of you calling me a bully. True, we took your ship,but since then, have you been mistreated? Have you been raped? Beaten? Locked in your cabin?”
“No, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time. And you did force yourself on me yesterday!”
Sara regretted her words the moment she’d said them. Yesterday’s kiss was supposed to have been forgotten by them both. She, of all people, shouldn’t have mentioned it, especially in such an inflammatory manner.
He tensed, the scar on his cheek standing out in vivid contrast to his tanned skin. He caught her about the waist before she could get away. “Is that really what happened yesterday? I forced myself on you, and you suffered my kisses? Strange, but I don’t remember it like that.” His voice lowered to a rough murmur. “I remember your mouth opening beneath mine. I remember you burying your hands in my hair and clinging to my neck. That’s not how most women respond to force.”
Furious at having her own weakness thrown in her face, she balled her hands into fists against his chest, but he jerked her against him, plastering her body against his taut thighs and lean waist. “You have no idea what force is, Sara. Maybe it’s time someone showed you what real force is like.”
“No-o-o …” she whispered as he bent his head to hers, but his mouth cut off any further protest.
His kiss was relentless, his hold on her unyielding. She squirmed and shoved at him, trying to free herself. With eyes glittering, he responded by setting her on top of the high trunk. Then he grabbed her wrists and twisted them behind her back, holding them with one large hand while he used the other to catch her jaw and hold her head still so he could kiss her again.
His was a punishing kiss, designed to make her hate him. And at that moment, she truly did. He tried to force his tongue between her teeth, but she held them tightly clenched, determined not to let him win. When she realized she couldn’tescape his grip, she bit his lower lip. He drew his head back with a curse, but he didn’t release her, even though she’d drawn blood.
“That, my dear Sara, is ‘force,’” he ground out. “And you don’t like it one bit, do you?”
She could have sworn she saw guilt in his eyes but dismissed the notion at once. This … this brute was incapable of guilt!
Then his gaze softened in the lantern light of the windowless hold, and his tone altered subtly to a more soothing cadence. “Not that I blame you. I don’t like it either. I don’t want you fighting me.”
His eyes seemed to drink in every line of her face. He softened his grip on her chin, then bracketed her throat lightly with his fingers. As she held her breath, he stroked his thumb and fingers down both sides of her neck. “No,” he said, his voice growing husky. “I prefer to have you as you were yesterday, soft, lovely . . . yielding.”
The words were a caress, and the way he looked at her mouth, as if it were a particularly juicy morsel, made shivers dance down her spine. She fought the traitorous sensations. “You can’t have me at all.”
“Can’t I?” A knowing smile touched his lips. He lowered his head, and she braced herself for another brutal kiss. Instead, he pressed his lips to the pulse on the side of her neck.
His lips were warm and buttery soft, nothing like they’d been moments ago. She tried to sit still, to pretend he wasn’t heating her blood and making her tremble like a needle on a compass. Whole surges of feeling were taking over her body. She couldn’t seem to stop them. His mouth moved higher to tease her ear, then scattered kisses along a path to her cheek, his rough whiskers scraping her skin.
Ignoring the desire that trickled through her defenses, she dragged in a shaky breath and kept as aloof as any womancould when a man was treating her body to a thousand delicate caresses. But when he began bestowing kisses on every part of her face except her lips, she found herself actually wanting his mouth on hers, craving his kiss there.
And like the scoundrel he was, he seemed to know exactly what she wanted. He drew back, his gaze fastening on her trembling lips. Then he covered them with his.
It was soft. Stealthy. Devilishly exquisite. He traced the curve of her lips with his tongue, then boldly drove it into her mouth. She told herself to fight him like the proper earl’s daughter she was. He had no business doing this to her.
But the fight had gone out of her. He felt so strong, so male. The ship’s hold was his domain, dark and secretive and full of temptations. Even the rocking of the ship seemed to conspire with him, forcing her to lean into him to keep her balance on the trunk. He thrust his tongue into her trembling mouth with possessive strokes, and every one made her weak in the knees … and the belly and the loins. Good heavens, no one had ever made her feel this … this treacherous restlessness, this urge to respond to every kiss with an equally fervent one of her own.
By the time his hand skimmed down her neck, then her breastbone to rest on one of her breasts, there was no resistance left in her. She did nothing, except to arch into his kiss like a shameless wanton.
Gideon felt the change in her at once, especially when he released her hands, because instead of pushing him away, she slid them beneath his vest to grip his waist. Confound her, she was amazing. Why didn’t she despise him for the cruel way he’d kissed her at first? He despised himself for it, so much that he’d kissed her again just to show her he wasn’t a monster.
Now all he could think of was touching and fondling her. His body was thinking for him, and he couldn’t seem to stop it.
Her response was so innocent, so untutored … so alluring. It made him want to tear off her clothes, lay her down on a bedroll, and bury himself inside her. He groaned as her arms tightened about his waist. He had to control himself. He had to act with restraint, to finish his demonstration of how dramatically force differed from mutual satisfaction. Then he could put her away from him.
But later. Much later. After he’d touched her all over, explored the body that had kept him awake hour after hour last night.
The layers of cloth between his palm and her breast frustrated him. Without stopping to think, he tugged loose the lace modesty piece demurely filling out the neckline of her muslin gown. She tore her mouth from his, her eyes wide, uncertain. As the scrap of lace drifted to the floor, he caressed the upper swells of her breasts and waited for her maidenly resolve to kick in.
