A relaxed breath slid out of her. She washed herself, the soap fragrant and luxuriant. She worked it through her long hair then, holding her breath and screwing up her eyes, she ducked under the water and rinsed the soap from her hair
She had a great lot of hair, and when she came up for air, she was sputtering.
That’s when she felt Aodh in the room.
He spoke, low and dark behind her. “A sword?”
Terror gripped her. She slammed her hand down around the hilt of her sword a second before his came down on top.
Beating him to the hilt made absolutely no difference, for he simply clamped his hand over hers and pressed down, pinning her hand to the hilt of the sword, and to the rim of the tub.
She jerked and tried to rise, but he stretched his other arm out and trapped her other hand to the rim of the tub too.
She was immobilized, arms stretched out, one impotently clutching the hilt of a sword.
His voice came beside her ear. “I underestimated you, Katy.” He sounded very, very angry.
She tried to struggle up again, to no avail. Warm water sloshed around her breasts as he held her down.
“I should have known.” His mouth brushed her ear, light and terrifying.
“Aodh…” she whispered.
“What were you going to do with it? The sword?”
“Naught, I swear to you. I simply feel safer—”
“Who? Who brought it to you?”
She tightened her jaw, shook her head.
He made a soft sound. “I cannot allow such defiance, Katarina. Surely you can see that.”
She shivered. It sounded like a prelude to something. A warning.
“Aodh, I vow…”
Her words, already weak, trailed off as his lips brushed her ear. Her mundane, utilitarian ear, never tended until Aodh and his tongue. “What, Katarina? What do you vow?”
“I am, I am sor-sor—”
“Och, are you going to tell me you’re sorry?”
His words were hot mockery, a taunt at best, but her body responded as if he’d touched her somewhere secret and private. Heat rolled through her, and shivers marched like armies across her skin.
“I’ll take your apology, for a start. ’Twill not be the end.”
Murmuring, whispering, frightening, arousing, his mouth moved down her wet neck, her hands still trapped on the tub. Her breasts bobbed in and out of the water, her nipples breaking the soapy surface, then sliding below. The alternating sensations of warm water and cool air added to the mad pleasure. Her head dipped back to rest on his shoulder, her arms still stretched out on either side.
He shifted to the side and slid his mouth down the front of her, to her slippery breasts now pushed up out of the water. He stroked his tongue over her nipple with a growl of possession. She was already wet, warm from the water, but the nudge of his tongue exploded a firestorm between her thighs.
He let go of one of her hands but kept the other clamped firmly under his.
“Do not move,” he commanded as he slid his hand into the wate
r. His tunic sleeve was drenched at once, turning the cobalt-blue fabric so dark it looked black. His hand curled around her inner thigh and pulled it to the side. Without preamble, he pushed up inside her. She watched his painted fingers enter her flesh, and her mind shut down.
Her hips bucked up, pushing him in deeper. She tipped her head back as far as it could go, turning to the side, reaching behind her with her free hand to curl around the back of his head, and pull his mouth to hers. He took her in a savage, demanding kiss.