Part 24 (2/2)

Then he led her hand to his mouth and placed a tender kiss on her knuckles.

Nora s.h.i.+vered as she recognized the fire in his crystal blue eyes.

”I've been wanting to kiss you for hours,” he said, his voice deep and hoa.r.s.e.

Nora smiled as she cupped his face in her hands. She stood up on her tiptoes and kissed him. Her brat fell from her head, down to her shoulders as he pulled her up to reach his mouth.

Her head swam at his taste.

She felt him reach around her and lift her skirt up.

Ewan knew he shouldn't be doing this. One of the gypsies could stumble across them at any moment.

But he couldn't pull back from her.

She was irresistible to him.

Nora gasped as he set her up on top of a tree branch and leaned her back against the tree trunk. Before she could ask him what he intended, he shoved her skirt back and spread her legs.

She trembled at the sight of him staring at the center of her body. His eyes were dark and hooded as he slid his fingers down her cleft and gently into her.

Then he dipped his head and took her gently into his mouth.

She bit back a cry of pleasure as she reached up to hold on to the branch above her.

Ewan was like a wild animal as he tasted her, and his caresses made her breathless and weak.

He pulled back, his eyes blazing as he loosened his trewes, baring his swollen shaft to her eager sight.

He kissed her lips a moment before he slid himself deep inside her.

This time Nora did groan out loud.

”Oh Ewan,” she choked.

His lips seared her as he thrust against her. Her body spiraled out of control, and when she came it was so intense that she couldn't keep herself from crying out.

With three deep, sharp thrusts, Ewan joined her.

Nora held him close as he breathed raggedly in her ear.

”What have you done to me, la.s.s?” he asked roughly. ”G.o.d help me, I can't seem to keep myself away from you.”

She laid her hand against his flushed, stubbled cheek. His eyes were dark and stormy. ”'Tis a madness that seems to envelop us both. For I feel the same of you. I know I shouldn't. You are everything I find distasteful in a man.”

He looked offended by that. ”Thank you, my lady.”

”Well, you are, and yet there is nothing about you that I find distasteful at all. Why is that?”

”I don't know. I should have taken you straight to my brother.”

”I'm glad you didn't.”

He kissed her. Then kissed her again and again until she was breathless and weak.

Nora sighed at the sensation of him around her while he was still inside her.

With a groan, he pulled back and left her with an aching void.

”We'd best not be too long or someone will come searching for us.”

He helped her right her clothes and covered her hair again with her brat, then led her back in the direction from which they had come.

As they walked, a lowhanging branch caught her brat and pulled it free of her hair.

Nora hissed at the pain. The bowed branch snapped back, tearing the brat from her head and dress, and launching it up to a higher branch.

”Oh bother!” she said, her voice rife with aggravation as she tried to jump up to reach it.

”Here.” Ewan moved her aside and tried to reach it. When he realized he couldn't, he moved to leave.

”Nay,” she said. ”We can't leave it in the tree.”

”Why not?”

” 'Tis my favorite and was a present from my mother.”

He growled at her words.

”Please, Ewan?”

His face softened. He handed her the basket and headed for the tree.

Nora watched in fascinated awe as he easily climbed the branches. He effortlessly worked his way out onto the branch where her brat was snarled.

The tree groaned in protest. Nora stepped back as a bad feeling consumed her.

Mayhap she shouldn't have sent him up there after all.

No sooner did he capture the wayward brat than the branch broke and sent him straight to the ground.

Her heart stopped at the sight of him falling.

”Ewan!” she gasped, rus.h.i.+ng toward him.

He lay on the ground unmoving.