Free Dance With the Enemy by Linda Boulanger Page A

she glared at him when he failed to retreat. She shook her head and snorted, the loose red curls swishing about her bared shoulders. “Suit yourself, but if you’re going to stay you may as well be of service.” Turning away, she thrust her arms into the sleeves, what little there was of them, then stepped back and pulled her hair away.
    Tahruk groaned, closing his eyes against the sight before him. He fought down the urge that flared at the vision of the expanse of flesh flanked by the open back of her dress. It took every ounce of restraint he had not to push the sleeves back off her arms. He imagined the dress pooling at her feet, the feel of her silken skin beneath his hands … He already knew how she tasted, how she smelled …
    “The buttons, my lord,” she commanded, her voice steeped in impatience. The toes of her stocking-clad foot thumped against the floor to reinforce her sentiment.
    “You would do well to hold your temper, Little One.”
    “And you would do well to help me so that this blasted night can commence.” After a charged moment passed without his reacting, she added with a less than demure nod to her head, “My lord.”
    “Hellion,” he mumbled, stepping forward, his fingers beginning to work at the buttons. Re-holing the dainty embellishments proved more difficult than their unfastening – a task he much preferred.
     
    A trip back to Tahruk’s chambers was still required for Elenya to quickly change and have her hair properly dressed by a corisan who proved little better than the one assigned on the night of the Dremis celebration. Unlike her predecessor, this girl held nothing of the overt boldness of Ceeda, instead exhibiting a mousy fearfulness that had an already frustrated Elenya taking the brush away from her and finishing the task herself. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t done for herself back home.
    Home. The thought swept her with sorrow. Nothing seemed to have gone as expected here, and the comfort of her own chambers seemed more a fading dream. She longed for the gaiety of evenings spent with her family, the security of her mother’s arms, Shemek…
    “Where is the maiden I found in the dressmaker’s shop -- the one with the fire in her blood and exasperated words threatening to spill from those lovely lips?”
    Elenya’s eyes snapped to Tahruk’s reflection framed in full by the length of the gazing glass. Straightening her sagging shoulders, she pushed the last of the jeweled pins into her knotted hair while she studied him. Like Shemek, he was dark haired, his skin bronzed from the hours spent outside training for battle. Both men were toned, muscular, though unlike Shemek’s younger body Tahruk had the physique of a fully developed man. He was quite magnificent, really.
    His movement away from the door frame startled her and Elenya jerked her eyes from his advancing form only to be drawn right back. He stopped directly behind her, taking his time to study her reflection.
    She jumped when he reached for a strand of hair she’d left loose to cascade over her shoulder. He smiled. “I like it when you leave part of your hair down,” he told her, his voice growing suddenly husky as he began to stroke her shoulder, his fingers trailing up her slender neck and along her jawline. “You look quite lovely, my lady.”
    Elenya hadn’t realized she’d been holding her breath until he bent to press a kiss to the back of her neck and it whooshed out, accompanied by a nearly silent moan.
    “If it was anyone but my father at the head of our table, Little One, I would bar the door and ravish you until we were both sated,” he whispered against her ear, eliciting another shudder from her innocent body.
    “You seem quite sure of your abilities, my lord.” Her raised brow earned a laugh from the warrior, though he didn’t bother to answer. Instead he stepped back and produced a jeweled box from inside the leather pouch fastened around his waist.
    “Have you chosen jewels for