Part 14 (2/2)
”You should be.”
He held her tighter. Her faint words rose up some time later. ”I am left breathing, which was more than I hoped for a few moments ago. My thanks.”
”Aye, angel.”
Her fingers throbbed with pain, but she suspected this was because Finian had s.h.i.+fted something back to right, and now the messages were flowing between her body and mind as they ought: Attend. This hurts. Attend. This hurts.
In fact, many things hurt. Her fingers, her knees, due to the small jagged rock she was kneeling on, but she didn't move. Because more important than the pain was the feel of Finian's arms around her, the soft, gentling words he was murmuring in her ear, designed to comfort and calm. They did both.
After a while, with great reluctance, she disentangled herself from the solid warmth of him. One could not lie in a warm embrace indefinitely.
”I'm fine now,” she said stiffly. He released her silently.
Throwing herself down on the ground, she tried to sleep. She punched the sack serving as her pillow and turned on her side. Ouch. Muttering, she flipped to the other shoulder. No, that was not helpful. She flung herself on her back, feeling the earth bite into her bones, and hummed until her own off-key tune annoyed herself. She tried imagining the sounds of a waterfall, hoping that would lure her into sleep. It didn't.
She stared up at the sky, which was lightening into predawn. It was no good, nothing helped. Tears loomed.
She heard a small movement in the gra.s.ses, then his arms were around her, pulling her backward into his warmth. He lay on his side and tucked her into his chest. As if she'd been waiting for just this, she relaxed.
”Rest, angel.” His soft, rough voice rumbled through her hair, onto her neck.
His lean, hard body was stretched against hers, heating every inch of her from neck to knees. One powerful arm was slung over her hip, the other stretched on the ground above their heads. She sighed deeply. This was beyond goodly, and more than enough to hold her pain in abeyance. Now, how had he accomplished that?
”Thank you,” she whispered just as sleep stole over her.
”Thank ye,” he murmured back. She snuggled in and his hand tightened on her hip. She fit right in.
Chapter 19.
When Senna awoke, Finian was already up, standing a few feet away, kicking more dirt atop what had been their firepit. Each time his foot moved forward, the rest of his body adjusted for the movement, muscular arms out slightly, the hair beside his face-that not trapped in its binding at the nape of his neck-swaying slightly. His chiseled face was dusky with beard growth. His gaze was intent on the pit.
She sat up. He looked over. His eyes dropped to her hand. ”Yer fingers?”
She thought about them, then realized the fact that she needed to think about them with purpose was a good sign. ”They do not throb so much, and there's no pock.”
He nodded appraisingly. ”Aye, no swelling. Here's yer chance to wash.” He pointed to a small creek she hadn't noticed last night.
She looked at it without moving. There was absolutely no way she was going to undress in front of him.
”Now, la.s.s. We leave as soon as we're done.” He pointed again.
”I do believe a good rest was all I required,” she said brightly. ”Sleep,” she added when he looked confused. ”Not a bath.”
His face cleared. One dark eyebrow slanted up. ”I will not watch ye, Senna.” Was he amused? It certainly appeared to be a smile threatening to break free on his face.
”I simply do not think 'tis wise to dampen my hand,” she said coldly. ”All your leech craft would have been for naught.”
A small smile did curve up a corner of his mouth at this, but he didn't say any more. He finished with the fire and started unbuckling his hauberk. Its flap fell down over the soft undertunic and he dragged the armor over his head.
”I don't want to hear any regrets later,” he said, his voice m.u.f.fled.
She didn't reply. She was too busy staring in amazement: the Irishman was going to undress right in front of her! The armor came off, and he pulled up the bottom of his tunic. He was going to remove it. She couldn't rip her eyes away. Excitement flew around her belly like birds coming out of a nest, swirling and fluttering. He tugged up, revealing his flat stomach. Senna lurched back into speech.
”You shall hear no regrets,” she said sharply. ”Although it seems quite likely that you knew of this stream last night when I wished to bathe, and did not mention it...”
Her words trailed off. There was simply nothing more to say on the subject, and the tunic had gone up and over Finian's head, dropping onto the ground beside him.
Tangled black hair fell down around his smooth, muscular shoulders as he rotated each one in turn, stretching his head the opposite way and groaning in appreciation, apparently unconcerned that she was watching him undress. Staring. She wrenched her gaze away.
He stepped over to the far side of the creek that ran in the gully, an easier access point than the side Senna stood on, and ducked his head under the water. He came out wet, and shook his head, sending water droplets spraying into the air. He pushed his hair off his forehead with a swift push of his palm, then looked at her.
”So tell me, la.s.s, why are ye the one managing the books for yer father's business?”
She watched as he splashed more water over his face, then took one of the cakes of soap and clumped its misshapen lump in his palm. He spread it over his cheeks and jaws. Reaching into the belt lashed to his waist, he pulled out a blade.
”You shave!” she exclaimed in surprise.
”Aye.”
She watched in utter silence. When he was done, he plunged his head into the water a second time, threw his drenched hair back, and revealed his unbearded face for the first time.
Long dark hair slicked back, revealing the sharp, fine lines of his jaw and cheekbones. His mouth still held the grin that so beguiled, the one that made her heart thump, but now the full sensuousness of his lips was fully revealed, and it set her heart hammering as she recalled what he'd done to her with them.
Thick fingers entwined in his hair as he shoved the hair off his face, and before Senna's eyes flashed an image of them tugging through her own. The sculpted definition in his arms, bent above his head, exposed curves and lines that her eyes followed with greedy intensity. A dusting of dark hair covered his flat, ridged belly, which narrowed to trim waist and hips, then widened again to thick, corded thighs.
Her gaze devoured his body as if it were a meal, mindless of the fact that he was watching her watch him. Finis.h.i.+ng, she lifted her gaze and encountered his wolfish grin.
”A woman who looks at a man like that, Senna, is a very tempting thing.”
G.o.d save her, the Irishman knew every turning in her wicked thoughts, every depraved notion and erotic wanting that had flickered through her mind. She blushed. He c.o.c.ked an eyebrow. Her flush met her hairline. She ripped her gaze away.
Apparently satisfied, he knelt back by the stream. ”The accounts,” he said, prompting her to recall his question.
She half turned her head, trying to ignore the sight of the bunched muscles of his thighs as he crouched beside the stream, splas.h.i.+ng water over the cake of soap in his large hand, then rubbing it over his wet arms and chest.
”I manage the accounts because I am quite good at it.”
”I didn't so much mean how ye came to it, Senna, as how yer father came to not. not.”
”Oh. Indeed. As I said, Sir Gerald gambled. Come a time, he would wager on anything. Horses, tourneys, raindrops, anything. Once he bet my mother's brother whether King Edward would choose Balliol or The Bruce to rule Scotland.”
Finian picked up his tunic and rubbed it over his damp hair. ”And which did yer father choose?”
She gave a bitter smile. ”One of the few times he was right, and the only time he was not pleased. Gambling became his pa.s.sion, after my mother left.”
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