Free Suzanne Robinson by Lady Defiant Page A

can you find comfort in the presence of a weasel?”
    He groaned and lay back on his pillows. The covers slipped lower on his hips, but he failed to notice.
    “Saints and apostles, I thought you forgave me for my rancorous barbs.” His hand darted out and caught her skirt. “I insist that you forgive me.”
    “I have. Now loose me.”
    Oriel dug in her heels, but he dragged her to him and captured another lock of hair.
    “You haven’t, you ill-tempered sprite. I’ll content me with nothing less than true forgiveness, not courtesy.”
    “I’ll not repeat myself.” She slapped at his hand, but couldn’t free her hair.
    Blade began to rise from the bed. “Oh yes, you will, or I’ll kiss you.”
    “No!”
    “Thank you for being so obstinate,” he said, grabbing her shoulders.
    Thoroughly alarmed, Oriel twisted in his grasp, but even wounded, he was the stronger. He put a hand on the back of her head and forced it down to his own. She watched his lips draw close and fall open. Crying out,she thrust her hand between them and covered his mouth with her fingers.
    “I forgive you!”
    Beneath her fingers his lips moved, and she tingled again. His tongue tickled her skin, and she yanked her hand from his lips. He burst out in a chuckle and released her.
    “Beshrew you, Oriel Richmond, for depriving me of the succor of your lips.”
    Oriel dashed out of his reach and scowled at her tormenter. Drawing herself up to her full height, she looked down on him.
    “I shall fetch the apothecary, my lord.” She turned sharply and marched to the door.
    “I need no apothecary, and I’d much rather have your nursing to make my blood rush,” Blade put a hand on the covers over his groin, “and my body stir.”
    “I shall fetch the apothecary,” Oriel said again, for all her clever retorts fled when she saw his hand spread out in so blatant a gesture.
    He smiled at her, and murmured in the same low voice that had enthralled her from the first. “Don’t fly,
chère
. I won’t hurt you.”
    Oriel paused. “I’m not fleeing you. I’m going to fetch the apothecary.”
    “As you wish. But I’ll be on my feet by tomorrow, so you’d best accustom yourself to having me near. I’ve come to press my suit again, you know.”
    She knew her mouth fell open, but it couldn’t be helped.
    “Again?”
    “Yes? Didn’t Lord George tell you?”
    She shook her head.
    “Well, I have, with his blessing, so you must needs learn to accept me. Don’t run away.”
    Oriel had raced into the gallery and looked back at him. He was still grinning at her and still hadn’t coveredhimself. No doubt he sought to cozen her and beguile her with his body.
    “I would never run away from the likes of you,” she said.
    “We’ll see upon the morrow,
chère.”
    Oriel lifted her chin. “We will not.”
    He wasn’t listening to her. His gaze had fastened on her face and then dropped down the length of her body.
    “Mirabile visu, chère
, most wondrous to behold.”
    Oriel swore, picked up her skirts, and ran, heedless of those mocking eyes and his annoying laughter.

Chapter
6

    I pray that love may never come to me

with murderous intent,
in rhythms measureless and wild
    —
Euripides
        
    Blade sat in the withdrawing chamber between Uncle Thomas’s library and apartments and his own chamber and polished the hilt of his sword with a cloth. He was in a foul humor. He’d been caught off guard and attacked by that scurrilous bastard Midnight and there was naught to show for his suffering except a sore shoulder and, to his disgust, an uncontrollable desire for Oriel Richmond.
    At first he’d blamed his rampant lust upon his wound. He’d awakened to find her close to him, her wild hair floating about her face, her wide green eyes fixed upon him. He remembered thinking he’d been caught sleeping in an elf’s bower. Later she’d touched him, and with her touch transformed him into a vilesatyr nearly mad with appetite. The violence