To Beguile a Beast (Legend of the Four Soldiers #3)(44)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

“You like that?” he inquired solicitously.

She could only nod as he slowly drew himself through her. He thrust with a small, controlled movement, his cock tunneling against her. She swallowed, not even caring about the wet, squishing sounds they made.

“Then,” he purred, “perhaps you are ready. For this.”

And he reared back and shoved himself full-length inside her. She arched her neck at the shock, the thrill, of being filled so suddenly.

Then he was hitching himself up her, pushing apart her legs to their widest point and grinding himself down on her. Down on her clitoris.

Oh, bliss!

She was incoherent, past speech, past thought, past humanity. All her being was centered there, experiencing, receiving, his exquisite lovemaking. She didn’t even know when she started to come. It was one long, endless implosion of heat. She trembled uncontrollably.

And somewhere—sometime—during all this, she heard him growl and opened her eyes. He was on straight arms, levered above her, watching her as he made love to her. But now there was no way to mistake his expression for disinterest. Now his upper lip curled back in an erotic sneer. Now his face shone with effort and sweat. Now his one eye gleamed with dark intent.

Masculine intent.

As she watched, he speeded his thrusts until the bed thumped against the wall. She spread her legs farther and wrapped them high over his hips, watching his struggle until his face twisted as if in agony. A cry ripped from his throat, and he jerked against her one last time.

And she felt his strength fill her with warmth.

ALISTAIR THREW OUT an arm early the next morning, reaching for something he wanted on an instinctual level, and it wasn’t until he came fully awake that he realized both that it was Helen he searched for and that she was not there. He sighed and scrubbed his face with one hand. He still wore the eye patch from the night before, and it itched. He tore it off and flung it aside and then just lay there in the half light of morning.

His bed smelled of sex and Helen.

She’d left sometime the night before. He’d been so exhausted from their lovemaking that he wasn’t even entirely sure when. Of course, she’d had to leave. There were the children to think of, propriety, and his sister still in the castle, but damn, he wished she were here now. Not just so that he could make love to her again—although he wanted that, too—but he also wanted to lie with her. To feel her warm curves against his body. To hold her in his arms while he slept and to wake to find her still there.

While she let him. Because although she’d never said anything, he knew she wasn’t the type of woman who could live simply for the moment. Sooner or later, she would start to wonder about the future, perhaps question if she could spend it with him. And then, inevitably, she would discover that he had no future to offer her.

Then she would leave him.

Lowering thought. He pushed it aside, at least for the moment, because he’d learned that there was no use fighting fate. Eventually she would leave him; eventually he would mourn her, but not today. He threw back the covers, washed, retied the eye patch carefully, and dressed. Sophia had said that she’d be leaving this morning, and he fully expected her to be downstairs, impatiently waiting while her bags were loaded into the carriage.

The hallway downstairs was deserted, however, when he stepped into it. He checked the front drive, but although the carriage did wait there, his sister was nowhere about. Perhaps she was taking breakfast. He strode back into the castle and made his way to the dining room, where he found one of the maids laying out silverware. She curtsied when she saw him.

“Is Miss Munroe about?” he asked.

“She hasn’t come down, sir,” the maid replied.

Alistair grinned. Sophia had overslept—a rarity and an occasion for ribbing. “Go up, please, and rouse her and Miss MacDonald. My sister wanted to make an early start this morning.”

“Yes, sir.” The maid curtsied again and scurried from the room.

Alistair found a basket of warm rolls on the sideboard and took one; then he wandered into the hallway again. He wanted to be present when his sister made her belated entrance. He munched on the bun, strolling down the hall toward the kitchens, and then he heard it. The sound sent a prickling chill down his back and turned the bun in his mouth to ashes.

Weeping. A child weeping.

Helen hadn’t gotten to this part of the castle yet, and there were several unused rooms off the ancient hallway. He strode from door to door until he located that forlorn sound, and then he pushed it open. The room was dim, dust motes floating in the feeble ray of sun creeping in from a dirty window. At first he couldn’t see her, until she moved and whimpered.

Abigail crouched in a corner, next to a sheet-draped settee, the puppy clutched in her arms.

He started forward slowly, not sure of the problem or if he could do anything about it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Wiggins sneaking from the other door at the far end of the room.

Red washed over his vision.

He had no memory of moving, no memory of intent, but when next he was aware, he had Wiggins’s scrawny neck in his grasp, and he was throttling the life from the man and knocking his head against the flagstones in the hallway.

“Alistair!”

Someone close by called his name, but he was interested only in the foul, reddening face in front of him. How dare he? How dare he touch her? He wouldn’t again. Never, never again.

“Alistair!”

A soft, feminine palm was laid against his scarred cheek. Gentle pressure turned his head. Then he was staring into harebell-blue eyes. “Don’t, Alistair. Let him go.”

“Abigail,” he rasped.

“She’s fine,” Helen said slowly. “I don’t know what he said to her, but he didn’t physically harm her.”

That, finally, was the only thing that restored reason to his brain. He abruptly let go, straightening and backing up a step. Only then did he see that Sophia and Miss McDonald stood at the bottom of the stairs, still in their wrappers. Miss McDonald had one arm around a wide-eyed Jamie. Helen stood shivering only in a chemise. She must’ve run down the stairs without even stopping to put on a wrapper. And Abigail was behind her, her face tearstained as she held the puppy in her arms.

He took a deep breath to steady his voice and asked low, “Did he touch you?”

Abigail shook her head mutely, her eyes locked with his.

He nodded and looked back to Wiggins, who was gasping for breath on the hall floor. “Get out. Get out of my castle, get off my lands, and make sure you never show your face near me again.”