Passion's Tide (30 page)
Authors: Sarah West
“Amber, can’t we finish this tomorrow?”
She parried a blow and dropped to her knees, swinging the sword around to hit the back of his legs, knocking him off balance
.
He fell, and she was on him in a moment with
her wooden blade pressed against his abdomen. “No need to.” She heard clapping, and when she turned she saw Logan
standing in the doorframe of his cabin.
“Impressive, both of you
.
Jackson, you should have let her win twenty minutes ago
.
Y
ou look as though you’re about to collapse.” Jackson hoisted himself to his feet with a grunt, gave Amber a playful bow, and then hobbled off to get cleaned up for bed. “I had Abe draw yet another bath for you, so you better hurry or it will be cold.”
She accepted his offer without hesitation, and the moment the warm water touched her sore muscles she allowed herself to relax
.
“I can’t help but notice that you haven’t removed the screen.”
“I wanted you to have the option of privacy
.” She slid down farther to dunk her head under the water, groaning as her shoulders resented the sudden movement
.
“Is everything all right over there?”
“Yes, I’m fine, but I think I may have strained something in my back
.
Hey…what are you doing?” She tried to cover her nakedness as he knelt besides the tub.
“Lean forward.”
“So much for my privacy,” she scoffed, but
she obeyed him nevertheless
.
His fingers began kneading the knots from her tense muscles, and
she began to loosen up
.
Her hands fell to her lap,
her head dropping onto her chest.
“Work yourself a littl
e too hard today?” Her response was a low moan as he massaged a kink from her neck, and he chuckled
.
“I’ll take that as a resounding yes
.
You know, you should really stretch before engaging in physical activity
.
It helps relieve some of the stress you are putting on your muscles, and lessens the chance that you’ll hurt yourself.”
“Thank you, Doctor Logan.” She winced as his fingers dug deep into her back
.
“All right fine, I’ll stretch
.
Happy now?”
“Immensely.” His hands, having
loosened her muscles enough to abate her discomfort, began moving slower, his touch softer
.
She was defenseless against his tender caresses, and her body began reacting to him, pushing back against his hands, her breaths becoming more ragged
.
Then she was being lifted from the bath, drops raining from her body and splashing back into the soapy water.
“What are you doing?” she whispered, her voice a feeble protest against the tumultuous storm raging inside her.
“I refuse to make love to you in a batht
ub twice in a single day, it just isn’t gentlemanly.”
“You’re…we’re going to make love again?” she stumbled over the words as he deposited her in the center of the large bed, and stopped to remove his boots
.
He
looked up from his task
.
“Unless you don’t want to?” She faltered, and he sent her a wicked grin
.
“I didn’t think so.” He shed the rest of his clothes.
“Now wait just one moment,” she said, scurrying away from him as he placed a knee onto the mattress and lifted himself up
.
He froze midway through his action, suspended as if time had stopped moving, one leg hanging off the bed
.
She was confused
.
“Now what are you doing?”
“I’m waiting, just like you requested.”
She tried to stay serious, but a giggle escaped from between her purse
d lips
.
“And how long will you remain immobile like this?” she inquired, as she plucked a long white feather from the down pillow and dragged it against his jaw line
.
“Until you request me to move again, my lady.”
“So you will stay completely, tota
lly still?”
“If that is your desire.”
“Hm, I like the sound of that,” she mused aloud as she trailed the feather down his chiseled chest, noting the restraint he displayed to not respond to the silky touch of down against his bare skin. She almost detected a tiny shiver travel through his abdomen, but not enough to declare a victory
.
So she began to tickle him lower…
“I thought you weren’t going to move,” she said with a smirk as she watched his body react to her stimulating touch
.
Glancing upwards she saw his eyes cloud over as he fought the impossible urge to keep from touching her
.
“Oh, I’m becoming familiar with that look,” she murmured, delighting in her provocation
.
“But how shall you react if I do this?” The feather floated to the floor as she wrapped a small hand around the base of his rigid length, his eyes smoldering as they followed her movements
.
Her touch was unschooled but dedicated, and his hand twitched against his side, yearning to stop her teasing and take co
ntrol of the situ
ation.
“Amber, I can’t stand to watch you touch me any longer
.
”
“Then close your eyes, because I’m not finished and you’re not allowed to move.” He gritted his teeth and shut his eyes, wondering if it was a mistake or the best idea he’d ever had to let Amber control him in such a way
.
What had seemed like playful mischief had turned into excruciating rapture.
And then, just when he thought it couldn’t get any more maddening, he felt the burning heat of her tongue graze the edge of his erection, and he
swiftly perished from the pleasure, transcending to heaven
.
His eyes shot open to see an angel with a halo of fiery red hair kneeling before him with her mouth around him, curiosity driving her to explore him with her sensitive tongue, cau
sing the bloo
d in his veins to boil.
This couldn’t be heaven, then,
he thought to himself in a haze of desire
.
Surely this torment was the work of a succubus
.
But then why did she appear so angelic as she licked her lips and leaned back onto the pillows?
“Come t
o me, my bronze Adonis,” she commanded with a heavenly voice, husky with need
.
He broke from his static pose and fell forward, burying himself inside of her without hesitation, swallowing her cry as he consumed her mouth with his own.
Her eyes fluttere
d closed as he thrust inside her savagely, almost as though he were frightened of what would happen if he should stop
.
She did nothing to prevent him, however
.
She too was swept away by the wave that crashed on top of them, drowning them in its
carnal
fury
.
Merciless and demanding, it cloaked them in a blind haze that drove them towards a shattering release
.
Faster and faster they moved until the
universe
crashed all
around them
, and as they collapsed beside each other the storm that had raged arou
nd them began to abate, like the ebbing of the tide after a long night.
Slick with sweat and sated beyond belief, Logan held Amber against his chest and stared at the ceiling
.
His rapidly beating heart was not distracting enough to keep her from drifting into sleep, however
.
So tired was she from the day’s activities that she ignored the way her pillow throbbed against her cheek and let her exhausted body carry her into oblivion, leaving Logan awake to contemplate what he was going to do about the woman
in his arms.
“Cap’n, you’d better come quick, I think he might be dead!” Logan glanced at Henry and considered ignoring the request, as it was most likely an exaggeration of a meaningless brawl
,
b
ut the fear in the boy’s words and the noise building outside w
ere
enough to make him put down his book and reach for his hat.
Outside, he pushed his way through the gathering crowd and groaned
.
At the center of the array was Amber, standing over a very pale and motionless Pax and wringing her hands
.
Logan dropped to his knees beside him and pressed his fingers to the side of his neck, relieved when he felt a faint pulse
.
“He isn’t dead, he’s merely unconscious,” he said as he rose
.
He scanned the faces of the me
n around him, and not seeing the doctor, instructed Henry to run and fetch him
.
“Should we move him?” Amber asked, a frantic edge to her voice.
“No, we’ll wait until Piers takes a look at him
.
If he did hurt himself, we don’t want to risk injuring him further
.
Can you explain to me what occur
r
ed?”
“I never expected this to happen. He’ll never forgive me,” she blurted out
.
Logan took her hand
as she met his gaze
.
“I know it wasn’t intentional, bu
t please, take a deep breath and tell me.”
“It was my fault, Captain,” Deacon declared as he stepped forward, his mouth set in a grim line
.
“I thought it would be fun to teach the men how to wrestle, like we did when I was a lad
.
The goal is to throw your opponent onto the ground, flat on his back.”
“Cornish wrestling?” Deacon nodded
.
“I’m familiar with the sport, but don’t you need jackets to mark four points on the body?” Amber spun around to reveal the charcoal marks between her shoulder blades and above her hips
.
“Very enterprising.”
“Anyway, Pax was sparring Miss Amber, and he flipped her over
.
But me and Jackson and David were judging, and David said he saw her land on all four pins, er, marks
.
That would make Pax the winner
.
But Jackson and I only saw three pins hit the ground, meaning she didn’t land flat on her back, meaning Pax didn’t win
.
So things got pretty heated up, and then Amber caught him off balance and hoisted him over her shoulder like I taught her.”
“Except when
he fell, he hit his head on the deck,” Logan guessed. Amber nodded.
The anxious men cleared a path for Piers, who shuffled forward with a leather medical case
.
He replaced Logan at the young man’s side and proceeded to check his pulse, listen to his heartbeat, and look at his eyes
.
“Well, his pupils are dilating, which means he is still responsive to light, and his heart rate hasn’t slowed
.
I’m guessing he should wake up shortly.”
“And will he be all right?” Logan asked for Amber’s sake.
“Do you
mean will there be any long-term, irreversible damage? Unlikely
.
The brain is well protected, that’s why we have such thick skulls
.
The worst he’ll have to deal with are some headaches here and there, but I have some laudanum in my trunk
.
A drop or two in a cup of hot tea and the pain should go
away.”
Relief washed over Amber as Pax’s eyes fluttered open, blinking against the sunlight
.
He groaned and lifted a hand to his head
.
“What happened?”
“The doc said that your thick head saved your ass,” Deacon explained with a
laugh
.
“But did I beat her?”
Amber glanced at Logan
.
“Yes,” they answered together.
“You’re both liars and you bloody well know it
.
That’s all right
,
though,” he stumbled to his feet
.
“Once I get rid of this damn throbbing we are going to have a
fair
fight.”
“What about the last fight wasn’t fair?” Logan asked, sensing Amber tense up beside him.
“I was blinded, plain and simple.”
“By what?”
“Her smile.” Logan rolled his eyes, but Amber only chuckled and leaned in to give Pax a kiss on his cheek
.
“Now I’m starting to feel faint again.”
“Then go lie down, you dolt
.
You aren’t getting anything else from me,” she told him with a good-natured smile.
