Love Thine Enemy (15 page)

He towered over her, muscle and moonlight, sensual
energy, his hair ruffled by the wind, one hand at rest on the hilt of his
sword, her wimple in his other hand, his manhood as hard as the rocks that
served as their walls. 

"Mayhap you are of the land as you claim, Lady
Rochelle.  Your hair glows in a silvered fan like the DuBois grapevines.  Your
breasts are the Pyrenees foothills, your womanhood, the dark cave that lures a
man to become lost in you.  And like the land, I must tame you, control you. 
Would that I could furrow your field, plant my seed in you."

He unbuckled his scabbard, and her heart thudded a
louder beat.  She tensed as he ran the engraved tip over her foot, up the
inside of her leg.  After her experience with Marcel, she should be terrified,
but for some inexplicable reason, her aroused body overrode her fear.  Of most
import, retreat meant failure.

"Widen them, my white falcon." 

His dark gaze challenged her to comply.  She did as he
commanded, and she felt vulnerable, exposed, and yet, titillated, as he had
predicted.  He caressed the scabbard up the inside of her leg to brush against
her womanhood.  She lifted her hips to meet the caress.

"You are a beauty, Lady Rochelle.  Marcel's
inability to play the husband lay not with your lack of charms."

The confession expanded warm swirls of tension within
her body.  Then he knelt beside her and teased her womanhood with the tip of
his hilt while he dragged the wimple over her nipples.  She arched her back as
the double sensations multiplied like hot snow in a hellish avalanche.  He
tormented her privacy to warm ambrosia, drifted the fabric along her stomach,
down her thighs, back to her breasts and her sensitized body screamed for some
type of release.

"From now on, Lady Rochelle, think only of
me."

His sword clattered to the ground and he captured her
lips with his, hot and wet, one hand in burning possession of her body,
touching, stroking, dazing her mind, scorching her soul.  She wrapped her arms
around his shoulders, marking him with her nails.  He trailed his kisses down
her stomach, to between her thighs and kissed her scars.  Then she felt his
tongue on that mysterious part of her and her womanhood released a honeyed
shudder.  A cry rolled from her throat and over the valley, returning with the
same anguish as when created.

He sat back on his heels, arrogant male superiority.

Curse him!

Rochelle struggled to catch her breath, all too aware
her sensations were beyond retrieval.

In a flash, she rolled to her knees, her now-damp hair
in a wild tangle about her face and torso, her determination to win, a wild
tangle of sensual revenge.  She would not lose now, not after what he had
brought to life in her. 

He met the challenge of her glare as if to say he had
warned her.

Like a large cat, she crept toward him, then leapt,
shoving him to his back.  She captured his mouth with her lips, captured his
rigid maleness with her hand, teasing both, exploring, touching, manipulating.

He groaned, then groaned again, and she sat back, a
victorious grin on her face.  His chest rose and fell with as much desperation
as hers.  Then his eyes narrowed. 

He grasped her breast.  She grasped his manhood.  He
flicked his thumb over her nipple and lightning raced along her veins.  She
flicked hers over his male tip and felt a moist bead. 

"Now, my stallion, something ordinary upon your
extraordinary flesh."  Clutching her hair in her fingers, she brushed her
tresses across his mouth, his chest, down his taut stomach, and he arched his
back. 

"Not ordinary.  Silken threads from the
moon."  He tugged on her strands and pulled her to him.  Instead of
meeting his kiss, she leaned the other way and sipped the liquid pearl from his
swollen tip, ran her tongue over his turgid length.  He bucked, moaned.  Pulse
raging, she straddled him and pressed her opening onto his maleness.  But
before she could sink onto him, he rolled her onto her back until he loomed
over her in naked splendor, his knees between her spread legs. 

"You are no novice, Lady Rochelle.  Mayhap not
even a virgin."

'Then mount me, my devilish stallion.  Slip your hot
length within me."

A muscle twitched along his jawline.  He worked a
finger inside her and she bucked against his hand.

"A valiant effort, Lady Rochelle.  And you have a
hymen."

Silver-lined clouds scudded over the fading stars
behind his head, alerting her that her time melted like her womanhood.  Frantic
urgency mingled with her carnal urgency.

 "At least rub against me, knight.  Let me feel as
much of you as possible before this time ends, for we may never share this
ecstasy again." 

The sheen over his flesh glistened in the moonlight as
he slid the tip of his manhood along her slick cleft.  "A woman is built
for a man's pleasure.  I warned you that I can satisfy my lust without taking
your innocence, and so I shall.  'Tis time for your final flight, my determined
falcon."

She couldn't imagine what he intended, but she must
stall him.  "First, fill me to my barrier.  I must feel you inside me,
even though not completely.  Give me this to remember of you."

"You think to ram me through you, but 'twill not
work, Lady Rochelle.  I'll pin your hips with my body."

"I care not, knight.  Or are you weaker than you
claim and fear your control will shatter?"

"I know what you do."

"Are you not curious?  Even though 'twould not be
deep, 'twould be better than not at all."

He didn't answer, and she knew he wanted to thrust into
her as much as she wanted him to.

"I would feel you, knight.  Once.  To last a
lifetime."

Weighting her to the ground with both his body and dark
scrutiny, he rocked his hips against her, fluid, rhythmic, sensual, and the
tension that hovered within and without, tightened, increased.  She felt his
hand between them, then a pressure at her entrance.  He entered her!  She
soared from her body.  Her mind too bemused to form a coherent plan, she only
relished the sensation as he slid in, then out, then in again, but just at the
entrance, not far enough.

He trembled.  The veins stood out on his arms, his
neck, and still he rocked.  A moan slipped from his throat.  He clenched his
jaw, then closed his eyes.

Beyond her reach, her soul hovered like a moth before a
flame, eager to fly into the fire and become one with the glow.

"Becket."  Her plea soared with her spirit. 
And still he rocked, but faster, and much too shallow.  "Help me, Becket. 
I beg you."

He reached between them as he rocked, rubbed that
mysterious spot with his fingers, and she left the earth, spiraling toward an
unknown destination.  His teases thrust her into a hopeful madness.  He would
lose control.  He would take her.  She could taste the victory.  Rochelle
grasped his buttocks with her hands, encouraging him deeper, but he worked at
the same depth, a faster cadence.

Her head rolled from side to side.  She groaned with
ecstasy, forced a whispered confession.  "I'm grateful you're not English,
my husband.  I would hate to slay anyone who makes me feel this heavenly
hell."

He stilled, then shoved away from her as if drenched
with cold water.  Her cry of failure rent the valley.  Her plunging spirit
impaled upon her broken dream.  She had erred.  She had called him her husband.

He glanced down at his maleness as if to detect blood,
then to her.  "The sky lightens on the Eastern horizon, Lady Rochelle. 
You lose."

Something shattered inside her, a pain so horrendous,
she surely split in two.  Already he had donned his pourpoint and now
haphazardly secured his hose.

She pushed to her knees and reached for him.  "
Non
,
I beg you."

He pulled her to her feet and draped the cloak around
her nakedness.  "I'll take you to your chamber."

A hatred she didn't know she could feel surged
throughout her body.  She spat in his face.

He recoiled in surprise, then lifted one corner of his
mouth in a sardonic grin.  "A cold dousing.  The perfect cure for hot
lust."

"I hate you, knight."

"And I hate you.  Be ready to leave within the
hour."

* * *

"Locking your nemesis in?  Or yourself out?"

Becket turned at the sound of Henri's voice, thankful
for anything to cleanse his mind of Rochelle.  "Both."

Henri laughed as he neared.  "Caught up in your
own punishment?"

Becket gripped the ring of keys.  "What know you
of the matter?"

"Not as much as I might.  I followed in case you
needed support, then decided you would run me through if I supported you in the
battle you had instigated."

"If you played voyeur---"

"Not on your titillating escapade, or I wouldn't
be able to sleep until old age.  I merely attended the cave entrance while you
attended your engaging enemy."

Henri moved alongside as Becket strolled toward the
stairwell to prepare for Rochelle's departure.  "Don't think I don't
appreciate your effort, Henri, but I paid heed to the cave."

Henri laughed again.  "An entire army could have
approached your backside and you wouldn't have noticed."

Becket snarled, angered at the truth.  He had lost
control, damn him, with almost disastrous results.  Of all the women he had
known through his active years, only she clouded his mind.  He had even
revealed his scars.  His hatred swelled.

"Never again, Henri.  She will be away within the
hour."

"So I heard."

"You behave as if you know all."

"I know more than you."

Dread stilled his breath.  "Which is?"

"I remained after you left the site."

"And?"

"And Gaston appeared.  He stepped out of the cave,
one hand over his side as if in pain, and watched you escort the fair temptress
away.  I'm surprised you didn't feel the visual daggers through your
back."

Becket halted, shaken by the news.  "Then she
planned to meet the butcher, after all.  What an accomplished liar.  Her
angelic purity hides a diabolic heart."  His hatred deepened to loathing. 
She had played him for a fool with her act of innocence and pretended passion. 
Rage torched through his body, as much for his own traitorous response as for
hers. 

"Distracted you, did she?"  Henri chuckled.

Becket fisted his hand on his hilt as he stepped down
into the great hall strewn with sleeping knights.  "Did you just let him
walk away?  Didn't you think yourself capable of capturing an unarmed, wounded
snake?"

"The viper slithered back into his den.  Even the
two of us couldn't capture him in that blackness.  'Tis why I didn't bother to
stop you.  I posted soldiers to observe and report."

"Rouse the others.  I need six to escort the
accomplished liar to her future prison as soon as possible."

"Before she seduces the seducer?"

"Before she discovers I participated in the
chèvauchèe
at Cotentin.  Before she learns I'm an English knight."

C
HAPTER
T
EN

"
B
ecket is a dead
man."  Gaston pressed his hand against his wounded side and grabbed the
reins, then winced from the pain.  The smell of the cedar trees surrounding
them mingled with the coppery scent of his own blood, but not for long. 
"Did you bring food and money?"

"In the pouch."

"Help me to mount." 

Gaston groaned as he placed his foot in the stirrup,
then pulled himself onto the horse.  Bile rose to his throat.  His face felt as
clammy as the cave, his clothes as wet as the waterfall. 

He wiped the dampness from his beard.  "For one
horrible moment I feared he would take her virginity."

"But he didn't."

"I hardly dared believe you when you told me
hadn't consummated the vows.  He committed a fatal error.  His hatred for her
will bring him down."

"He sends her to a convent."

"And into my trap.  I'll trail them from a
distance until I know which nunnery.  I'll slip in at night, rape her, and take
her to Moreau. Then DuBois will be mine." 

“Your scheme is for naught.  As heir, Becket inherits
DuBois without the consummation.  He but dallies with her.”

“You spineless fool.  He has no proof.  The idiot sends
away his best claim to DuBois, a blunder I will use to defeat him.”  Gaston
reached for the flask, nearly vomiting from the agony of movement. 

"You can't go to Moreau, Gaston.  He has claimed
your estate as well."

"Slay him, then the only estate he'll claim is his
grave." 

"And risk detection?"

"You risk more than detection if you fail."

 Gaston wrenched out the cork and took a swig.  Liquid
burned a welcome trail down his throat and eased his queasy stomach. 

"'Tis not as with the others, Gaston.  Becket is
different, more astute, less trusting, less affected by my influence."

"Do something to gain his confidence if you must. 
But kill him."

The waterfall filled the silence as Gaston waited for
the expected compliance.

"How?"

He shoved in the stopper.  "Like before.  Poison the
wine.  Or be creative.  Just make certain he dies."

"What if I'm caught?"

"Slit your throat."

He heard the gasp.

Gaston sneered and leaned forward.  "If you reveal
anything, and I catch up to you, I'll take revenge within my dungeon.  You've
witnessed the macabre gories that excite my soul.  You know how creative
I
am." 
He fought a laugh.

"You wouldn't.  Not after all we've done
together."

"Which should convince you I have no qualms about
another mutilation.  In truth, too much time has passed since blood other than
mine has run through my fingers."

"In return, I want the boy."

Gaston chuckled.  "Pierre?

"Don't take offense.  I prefer them young."

"Lady Rochelle has too much attachment to him
anyway.  He's yours. 
After
Becket is dead."

"He will be.  Soon."

Gaston gathered the reins.  "I can't wait around
here.  They'll be searching for me."  He urged his mount from out of the
shelter of the cedars.

"What if aught should go awry?  How do I reach
you?"

Gaston turned his steed but stayed behind the brush.  "If
'tis before they depart for the convent, use polished brass to signal from the
parapet.  I'll meet you behind the waterfall after dark."

"Becket has knights searching for you."

"They'll expect me to be traveling away from
DuBois.  If the entourage leaves as scheduled, then I'll return as soon as I
have Lady Rochelle sequestered at Moreau." 

"But the guard---"

"If you do your job, there won't be a guard.  Even
so, make certain the secret passageway remains unbarred.  And Becket had better
be worm fodder by the time I return.  If not, you will be . . .  after I've had
my . . . pleasure."

"Don't threaten me."

"Then kill him."