Isolde's Wish (2 page)

Isolde blinked up into the smoldering green eyes, wondering if he was jesting. Surely an assassin possessed evil features—a twisted, angry mouth, bad skin, and glaring eyes. Not this golden-haired god who stood before her.

She watched the god’s lips move and knew he formed words, but couldn’t clear the buzz in her brain enough to hear. His wide mouth turned her insides to porridge.

He smiled again in a slow, crooked way. “Ye haven’t registered a single thing I’ve said, have ye, Princess?”

She disliked the way he addressed her. “Princess” was spoken with scorn rather than the deference typically used, but his eyes softened his tone. They glittered like one of the emeralds she was so fond of wearing on her finger.

“I asked if ye were injured from yer fall,” he repeated. When she still didn’t respond, he leaned in so that his breath washed her face. He smelled of clean male sweat and maybe a hint of some fresh grasses he’d chewed. His teeth were blindingly white behind lips that looked as if he’d eaten berries to break his fast. And though he was all rough male, he had bladed the hair from his jaw.

Isolde found her voice. “Not hurt.” She hated the little breathless squeak that sounded. “I’m fine, thank ye.” She smoothed her golden skirts and patted her cleavage nervously, hoping her overly full breasts hadn’t escaped in the tumble.

He grinned appreciatively. “All accounted for, Princess. I’ll attest to it.”

“What is yer name, sir?”

“No need to call me sir. I am no gentleman.” He flicked his head. The yellow queue of his hair slithered over his naked shoulder.

All at once, Isolde was painfully aware of her situation. Her face prickled with heat. She knew the coloring made her freckles stand out in stark contrast and blushed more furiously.

A hot fingertip touched the point of her chin and tilted her face up to his gaze. In a quiet and bone-shivering deep voice he said, “I am Sadler. Son of Corbet.”

She felt her eyes flare at the name. Too late, she realized her folly. She edged her foot backward; her thigh muscles trembled for escape. The image of his wanted poster flashed through her mind, making her heart flutter with mingled excitement and trepidation.

“I see ye recognize the name, Princess. Corbet, the man who took yer mother to his bed and lost his life for love. Aye, many an afternoon she sneaked into my father’s workshop. While they had their romp, I’d run the android stable, keeping the robotic horses fueled and brushed and their gears well oiled, renting them out for good prices. When the visit ended, yer mother always had a kind word for me. I think I fell in love with her a little myself.”

Sadler searched Isolde’s face, and she wondered if he saw her mother reflected in her blue-green eyes. She’d heard it often enough. His fingers lifted to brush the wisps of tangled hair from her temples.

“Aye, now that I see ye, Princess, I remember yer mother well. I remember this face,” he whispered, palms sliding down her cheeks. The warm pad of his thumb rubbed over her lower lip. Without thought, she let her tongue dart out and tasted his salt.

Sadler started. A low moan escaped his chest. And then she was yanked onto tiptoe, and his mouth slammed into hers, crushing, bruising, his searing tongue separating her lips and mating with hers. Isolde had been kissed plenty by the stable hands and kitchen boys and even her father’s page. Never had a kiss ignited her blood like this.

He twitched her against him with a hand on her lower back, bringing her into intimate contact with his naked form. She inhaled sharply at the heat emanating from him. How could one unclothed man hold so much heat?

She softened beneath his touch, losing her head in his taste. His hands found her waist, and they kneaded and caressed the sides of her ribs so that his knuckles brushed her breasts. Isolde strained for more.

Sadler’s chest rumbled with his laughter. He angled her head and plunged his tongue deeper into the recesses of her mouth. Though he was cleanly shaven, his jaw was coarse against hers, scraping her skin deliciously. Between them, his cock swelled and pressed against her lower belly. What would it feel like in her hands? Would it feel as hot as the rest of him?

Their kiss turned carnal. Isolde was clay in his hands. He twisted her and prodded her to fit him, and when his hands were molded to the tight peaks of her breasts, she thought she’d explode. Her nipples strained against the silky fabric of her chemise and the confines of her tight bodice. She knew what they looked like when they hardened. How many times had she flicked her rose-colored nipples, circled them with a lazy index finger, wondering how it’d feel to be touched by a man?

Sadler’s mouth left hers, and he spattered the hollow of her throat with wet kisses, his tongue teasing along her collarbone and lapping tenderly at her cleavage. With a deft movement, he freed her breasts. They shuddered atop the shelf of fabric, bare and vulnerable to a man she didn’t know and couldn’t for the life of her imagine why she allowed these liberties.

Except he set her on fire.

The cleft between her thighs grew wet as Sadler’s mouth closed about one nipple. He sucked it into his hot mouth. She gripped his face. Her eyes fluttered shut at the mind-blowing sensation, and when her knees gave out, he lashed her to him and supported her weight.

“Lovely golden skin,” he murmured as she guided his head to the other nipple. He ground his hips against hers, and she ground back, loving the pulse of his stiff cock against her.

“I know ye’re a maid, else I’d take ye right here beneath the boundless blue sky,” he whispered, kissing a path back to her lips. She opened them eagerly to his tongue and hungrily sucked it into her mouth.

They spent long minutes exploring each other while the flies buzzed over the carcass of the pig several feet away. The breeze freshened, bringing the obnoxious scent of death and jerking Sadler from her.

He continued to grip her upper arms, staring into her face and granting her another heart-melting smile. “Well, lass, we’d best be on our way.”

“Where?” she asked, emerging from her haze of passion with a start. She realized her palms were splayed against his chest, and her pinky fingers toyed with the silver bars of his nipple piercings. Her hands fell to her sides.

“Why, back to the castle, of course. Unless ye intend to travel the distance alone and unarmed, looking as if ye’ve been ravaged by a band of men? Or in this case, one very wanted man.”

He tilted his head back and laughed, a rich sound that started the wetness flowing between her legs all over again. “Wait for me here, woman, while I dress. And don’t grow too cold by my absence.” With that, he scooped his ax from the sandy earth and disappeared into the trees at a dead run.

Chapter Two

Sadler balanced on one foot and slipped his legs into his loose breeches, his mind spinning from the encounter with the maid on shore. Or princess, rather. Whatever name he chose to use, it spelled trouble.

When he had come across the loch at dawn, filthy and exhausted, he had dived straight in, clothes and all. After a cursory wash and a quick swim, he had stripped off his clothing and draped them across a low-hanging branch to dry. They fluttered in the faint breeze, and he bundled them into his arms.

He knotted the drawstring over his stiff cock and pulled the rough tunic over his head. It tugged against the bars piercing his nipples, reminding him of the princess’s ticklish touch.

“Ye’ve gone soft in the head, Sadler,” he said under his breath. Gripping his bow and shouldering his quiver, he stepped over the enormous, fifteen-feet-long body of a
zeppelgonger
, a robotic creature he had managed to bring down that morning after crawling out of the loch. Its bronze metallic shell lay unmoving, massive legs splayed, arms sticking out from its rectangular chest cavity like two tree trunks. Sadler glanced at its head, blocky and miniature in comparison to the body, and saw the usually shifting eyes were still.

The zeppelgonger army had been created expressly to hunt Sadler after the attempted murder of the king. The Earl of Millvale, the man responsible for inventing the army, had taken personal offense to Sadler and his obtrusive ways. It roamed the hills of the kingdom alone with a whole host of gadgets created to track him.

Sadler broke from the tree line, hoping she’d fled without him, yet dreading her absence.

His ill-fitting leather boots sank deep into the mud. He’d happened across a body swinging from the high branches of a tree near the edge of the wood. The noose had nearly severed the wrongdoer’s head from his body, but his boots were still good. Too bad the leather mashed Sadler’s toes.

Princess Isolde faced away from him, her arms crossed about her waist and her long blonde hair falling heavily down her spine. Sadler’s fingers twitched with the urge to twist the mass about one fist and force her head to his mouth. Except she didn’t need much coercion. A simple “kiss me, Princess” would do, if he were so inclined to say it.

“Ready?” he asked roughly, stepping up to her side.

She looked at her feet, rocking a bit on her heels. Her mouth was a fine pink seam, and she refused to look at him.

“Out with it, woman.” He planted his boots inches from her filthy slippers.

“I have no wish to inconvenience ye, sir. If ye’ll point the direction, I’ll find my own way back to the castle.”

Sadler nudged her chin up and stared hard into her eyes, allowing her to see his disdain for her suggestion. “Like hell ye will, Princess. This way.” He took off into the brush.

His strides were long, and he didn’t bother to hold aside the branches for her to comfortably pass beneath. Behind him, she picked her way through the tangle of trees in silence. A backward glance showed her face, solemn with determination, her ripe lower lip caught in her white teeth.

Sadler came to a stop. “Did ye really think ye could make it to the castle on yer own, Princess?”

“Stop calling me that.” She flicked her eyes to his, spitting blue-green fire. Only in a fairy realm would fire that color exist.

A laugh broke from his chest. He bent at the waist and swept his arm in a mock bow. “What shall I call ye?”

“I don’t like the way ye say ‘Princess.’” She twisted away from him and headed off, deeper into the woods.

He trailed behind her, tormented by the sway of her round little hips beneath the golden skirt. Above that, her waist looked impossibly slender, though he knew she wore nothing to cinch it. When he’d reached into the bodice of her gown, her soft, unrestricted breasts had jumped into his hands.

“I’m sorry to have offended ye,” he said, catching up to her. He darted in front of her and ducked to peer into her eyes. They flashed with something other than annoyance, filling Sadler with a strong impulse to kiss her again. “What would ye be called?”

Her mouth pursed as if she struggled not to smile. She gave him a look from beneath her thick, pale lashes that raised steam from his flesh. “I would be called Isolde, sir.”

“And I’m Sadler, not sir. Just Sadler.”

“Sadler, son of Corbet,” she said, reminding him of the hopelessness of the situation.

“That’s right.” He dropped into step behind her. The woods filled with birdsong and the sounds of small animals scurrying underfoot. He watched her high-step through the tall brush, admiring the feminine turn of the wrist that supported her heavy skirts. With every step, the pale pink flesh of her shapely calves winked at him.

A torrent of need slithered through him. What had possessed Princess Isolde of Weligbyr to allow him to drop a single kiss to her sweet lips, let alone ravage her mouth, throat, and luscious breasts?

He jerked to a halt. A long moment passed while he stared blankly at the green canopy above, his mind awhirl. King Adlard, her father, was presently in the castle, and they would arrive there shortly. Sadler’s opportunity to achieve his goal had presented itself in a lovely little golden princess package, all tied up with strings leading directly to the king—the chance he’d waited for.

“Isolde.” He thrashed through the brush to reach her.

She paused to let him catch up. “What is it?”

He closed his fingers about her wrist. The fragile bones beneath the flesh felt as delicate as a bird’s. But rather than take flight, she swayed toward him. And then she was in his arms, her plump breasts crushed to his chest, her feet slipping from her shoes as he pulled her against him, and her mouth opening to admit his tongue.

Sadler pressed his thumb into the hollow at her nape, his fingers tangling in the golden threads of hair, caressing her warm scalp. He felt a thrill that her hair was unbound, loved that it fell in a heavy sheet over his forearm. He never wished to see it confined by a proper maid’s coronet of braids. Loose and free best suited Princess Isolde.

She rubbed her tender body against him as he cupped her buttocks and jerked her hips into the shelter of his own. They nestled together perfectly. Again and again he plunged his tongue into her sweet mouth, tasting the hot interior, fighting to get closer, seeking more heat.

Breaking away, he gasped for control. The heat he needed he could not taste. Not ever.

He stared down into her eyes, as brilliant as the jewels glittering on her fingers. A haze of passion lived within those eyes, and he’d only had a glimpse of the passion that lived within the body. He realized she clung to him and gently released her.

He put some distance between them. “My lady,” he whispered, bowing his head.

Her palm cracked off his cheek with stunning force. He rocked backward.

“What the hell was that for?”

“For…for yer humility. How dare ye?” she spit. He caught her hand as she aimed for another strike. Her muscle trembled to be freed.

“If ye know what’s good for ye, woman,” he said through clenched teeth, “ye won’t try that again.”

She screamed through her tight jaw and twisted her wrist in his iron grasp. “Let me go. Ye cannot restrain me this way.”

Suddenly she brushed against his arousal. She grew utterly still before crumpling inward and sagging into his hold.

“Isolde, Isolde, help me understand.” He stroked the damp tendrils of hair from her eyes.