He sighed, then drew breath. “So what else did you imagine?”

“Well, if I was the lady of Restormel Keep, then obviously”-she lifted her gaze once more to his eyes-“you were my lord.”

He swore softly in French. “Do you really want to venture there”-bending his head, he nipped her lower lip-“lady?”

She laughed softly and drew him back to her. “Oh, yes.” She breathed the affirmation over his lips, then kissed him voraciously, then drew back. He let her, just.

“So,” she said, moistening her lower lip, her gaze lowering to his lips, “you’re my lord, and you’ve just returned from chasing brigands, and I’ve been waiting for you here.” She swayed in his arms, swishing her hips side to side against him. “You’ve just ridden in and come up, ordered my ladies from the chamber, and here I am, in your arms.” She lifted her gaze to his. “What would you do next?”

His eyes had darkened, their expression more intense; the planes of his face seemed harder-more, indeed, like the lord of legend she’d painted him.

“What I do next…would depend on a number of things. Such as…” One hand slid down and around; cupping her bottom, he jerked her up and to him, so the vee at the junction of her thighs cradled his rigid erection. His eyes held hers, watching her reaction as he evocatively rocked. “Have you been obedient? Or not?”

Her nerves were already unraveling with anticipation; it was an effort to cling to enough wits to respond appropriately. Holding his gaze, she arched one brow haughtily. “Me? Obedient? I’m part Viking, remember?”

“Ah. I see.” His gaze, hard and ruthless, raced over her face. “So you haven’t yet been tamed?”

“Oh, no,” she affirmed. “Not yet.”

She pretended to push him away, to wriggle from his hold; he didn’t budge. Relentlessly he held her close, pressed her to him; on a gasp, she turned her head as if spurning him. Locking her to him with one arm, he raised a hand to frame her face, not gently yet as he forced her face to his, there was neither violence nor the threat of it in his touch.

He looked down at her, deep into her eyes.

She glimpsed him behind the ruthless mask, sensed his hesitation. “Don’t stop.”

A whispered plea, it sent a faint shudder through him.

His lids flickered, then he locked his eyes, intent and burning, on hers. Slowly bent his head. “I’m not even sure I can.”

His lips covered hers. Firmed, then forced hers apart. He surged into her mouth, claiming, branding, devastatingly commanding, and passion, unleashed, swept them away. Within seconds she was reeling, unsure if the turbulent tumultuous tide came from him or herself. Or them both. It was her imagination that had scripted the scene, but her words, her fantasy, had struck a chord in him.

Struck a deeply buried vein of ruthless possessiveness and sent it raging.

His hands raced over her, impressing even through the plush velvet of her habit, in some strange way even more erotic than if he’d stripped her naked. She shivered, a reaction that came from her bones. His tongue whipped fire down her veins; his hands roamed, claiming, kneading, flagrantly possessing, and she wondered what she’d invited, what degree of surrender he’d demand.

Realized she didn’t care. She’d asked for this, wanted it, needed to know of it, of him and what, once stripped of the restraint of civilization, lurked within him when it came to her.

So she played her part, simultaneously acquiescent, for no lady could deny her lord his rights to her body, yet also holding back, denying him the ultimate surrender, making him work for that, demanding he conquer her before she would yield that, too.

A dangerous game; the last remnant of sanity remaining to her knew it, yet equally knew that with him, despite him being the very source of the danger, or perhaps because of that, she was safe.

She had nothing to fear and everything to gain. And a great deal to learn.

Such as how desperate he could make her, that simply through the combination of his heavily shielded if blatantly explicit caresses and the voracious demands of his lips and tongue, he could reduce her to a state of sobbing need. To where her blood thundered in her veins, to where her skin burned and her flesh throbbed, and a telltale empty ache blossomed inside her.

Their kiss turned savage, primitive and demanding, then he broke from it and growled, “Do you want me inside you?”

“Yes,” she gasped, breathless, the word faint. “Now.”

His hands closed about her bottom and he moved provocatively against her. “As my lady desires.”

The words rang with maleness, arrogant and sure, dominant and demanding.

He’d been holding her high on her toes; he eased her down so her feet touched the stone slab. Relief flashed through her; she reached up to twine her arms about his neck-he released her, caught her hands and spun her around, then locked her against him, her bottom to his hips, her back to his chest.

“First things first.”

The gravelly words brushed her ear; releasing her hands, he reached for the buttons of her short jacket. He opened it and pressed the halves wide; she used the moment to catch her breath-lost it again when his hands closed over her breasts and kneaded possessively, then he set deft fingers to the buttons of her blouse. The change in protection from velvet to fine linen had made her senses spin, but then he spread her blouse wide, with two tugs stripped down her chemise. A breeze threaded through the window slit before her, caressing her flesh with cool fingers, then his palms cruised over the swollen mounds; his hands closed, hot and hard, taking possession. They kneaded, then his fingers found her nipples and she gasped.

Arched as he knowingly played. She was suddenly brutally conscious of the flaring need to have him inside her, to take him into her body, already ripe and waiting. Wanting.

As if he knew, he released her breasts, caught her hands, drew them forward until her arms were straight, then pressed her hands palms down against the beveled edge of the window slit before them, where the carving in the stone formed a small ledge at hip height.

“Your hands stay there.”

An absolute order. Reflexively, she gripped, wondering; the stone was at least solid beneath her hands. She was half-bent forward; before she could think, she felt him gathering the back of her skirts, felt the rush of cool air across her heated skin as he lifted them. He pushed them to her waist as his hand boldly roved, making free with her body as a lord might with his lady’s. His hand caressed, blatantly claiming; his fingers probed, tracing her softness, opening the swollen folds, then sliding into her, pressing in, then explicitly stroking until she sobbed with frustrated need.

“How disobedient have you been, lady?”

She tried to catch her breath, tried to think-couldn’t, not with his fingers playing so evocatively. “Ah…”

“Never mind.”

She felt him shift behind her.

“You still need to be tamed.”

He thrust into her. In one smooth, powerful, relentless invasion he filled her to the limit, until she could feel him beneath her heart, in her throat, throughout her body.

Then he rode her that way.

Hands locked about her hips, he held her immobile and repetitively filled her, the fabric of his breeches against her bare bottom an added stimulation, emphasizing that to him she was exposed, vulnerable-his for the taking.

And he took.

He’d entered her from behind before, but only in their bed; she’d had no idea it could be this…primitive. This powerful, this erotic. Far beyond breathless, she clung to the stone, arms braced, her body riding his thrusts as he filled her again and again. Lids falling, she gave herself up to the moment, to the experience, to the building excitement as he expertly pushed her sensually further, then further still.

Until she gasped, “Why here? Like this?”

Instinct told her that was important to understand.

“So when you scream my people in the bailey will hear and know of your surrender.”

It took a moment for her reeling mind to digest the implications, to assess the intensity of the sensations buffeting her. “I don’t scream.”

“You will.”

Charles volunteered nothing more, his mind totally engrossed in ensuring she did. Her fantasy, the fact she’d so long ago had the thought of him as her lord…any chance of him retaining even a semblance of control had flown the moment she’d told him. The role she’d created for him was so close to the one he wanted, to the one he needed to claim; had any other lady made the suggestion he’d have thought she was insane to tempt him so, yet with her…it was one of the reasons he had to make her his.

Her breathing had fractured into sobbing gasps; arms braced, she rode his thrusts instinctively, her scalding sheath closing about him, clasping, clinging, drawing every ounce of sensation from each strong stroke, from each powerful penetration. She was close to the edge, the tension inside her coiling ever tighter. He pressed even deeper, freed one hand and reached for her breasts.

Swollen and firm, the heated flesh filled his palm. He played briefly, his thumb roughly circling her aureola, then he caught her nipple between his fingers and squeezed. Hard. Then he synchronized the squeezes with the movement of his hips.

And she shattered.

Screamed.

The sound, purely feminine, intensely evocative, sank into him like a spur and shattered what little control he had left. He thrust harder, deeper, then held still as she convulsed around him; eyes closed, head back, he savored her release.

But it wasn’t enough.

The instant the last of her tension left her, he withdrew from her, letting her skirts fall as he swung her into his arms, then went to his knees. He laid her back on the warm stone before him, arranging her as he wished.