Free Dark Stallion by Raven Willow-Wood

when he pulled his short sword from the waist of his loincloth. It wasn’t much relief when he merely used it to start two tears on either side of the skirt where he’d pulled the fabric loose.
    “What the hell are you doing?” Colwin demanded.
    Aydin didn’t even glance at him. “She nigh drowned last night because of this ridiculous thing she is wearing. If she ‘falls’ in the stream again, I would just as soon she does not have this to carry her to her grave,” he said, flicking a sardonic look up at her.
    His comment caused a mixture of feelings. Emma was still uneasy about his plan until she saw he’d fashioned a ‘loincloth’ similar to what the two of them were wearing, cutting away the yards of extra fabric along each side of the bodice and then shortening the fabric in the front and back to just above her knees. She felt ten pounds lighter when he’d finished—not an unwelcome change. The problem was, it wasn’t a loincloth, and she didn’t have any underwear, and she felt downright indecent with her bare hips showing on either side of the damned thing!
    Because it was indecent! One breeze and she’d be completely exposed!
    It wasn’t bad enough the damned thing was cut so low at the neck her boobs were in danger of falling out? Now she had her bottom hanging out, too! She almost felt like she wouldn’t have been as exposed nude as she was in the outfit she ended up with when he was done.
    Both men stood back and examined it.
    She couldn’t tell much about their expressions beyond the fact that Aydin didn’t seem nearly as pleased with his handiwork as Colwin did.
    “This will be more suitable for the forest,” Aydin said after a prolonged moment, his voice sounding a little hoarse.
    Colwin swallowed a little convulsively, but he merely nodded.
    Aydin jerked his head at her after a moment. “Go with Colwin. We need to get moving.”
    As Colwin led her away, she glanced back at Aydin as he bent over to collect the fabric he’d torn from her dress and bundled it with what was left of the underskirt she’d been wearing. Trying to comfort herself with the thought that they were too tall to get much of a view even if the wind did catch what was left of her skirt, Emma struggled with how she felt about her situation in general and Aydin in particular.
    She didn’t quite know what to make of him. The night before, when he’d kissed her, she’d felt like the most beautiful, desirable woman in the world. It wasn’t just the things he’d made her feel that had made her drunk with desire. His touch had been so … desperate that she’d felt like he found her as desirable as she did him.
    And yet, afterwards, when she’d been relishing the most fantastic climax she’d ever had—when he should have been as thoroughly enchanted as she was—he’d seemed more angry than anything else. That had wounded. She supposed it shouldn’t have. She supposed she should have realized that it was just sex, but she’d felt more than that. She’d been convinced he felt more than just a wild, animal attraction.
    His anger afterwards had made her rethink the situation, had brought the unpleasant suspicion home that, to his mind, it may have been more an act of conquest than she’d realized at the time. It hadn’t felt like rape, but was it?
    And if she hadn’t felt like it was at the time, did it become that upon reflection because she thought she’d misunderstood his motives?
    She still didn’t understand, she thought angrily as she crouched at the water’s edge and bathed and drank her fill of water. When he’d refashioned her dress, he’d seemed more intent on making certain she was comfortable, safe. It seemed a contraction when he’d just been denouncing her as deceitful that he would turn around and make it easier for her to move around—easier to run if she felt the urge.
    It occurred to her forcefully that men were always inclined to think women used sex to manipulate them and that Aydin